Expected: 20 February 2020
The Blurb
On an island off the windswept Irish coast, guests gather for the wedding of the year – the marriage of Jules Keegan and Will Slater. Old friends. All have a secret. All have a motive. One guest won’t leave this wedding alive . . .
The Review
This was not quite what I was expecting, falling somewhere between a classic who-dunnit and a contemporary psychological thriller. My feelings towards it are also somewhat mixed but let's start with the good...
This was cleverly written with brilliant contrasts and parallels. For example, you have the drink and drug fuelled debauchery of a celebrity wedding against the stark setting of an isolated, unforgiving, treacherous island with its deadly cliffs, extreme weather and peat bogs. Similarly, the characters outwardly all appear fun-loving, carefree and beautiful with their designer outfits, wealth and flawless make-up but underneath are actually anxious, angry and unhappy individuals hiding a multitude of guilty secrets and regrets. Likewise the dark, unpredictable, stormy island perfectly mirrors the dark, unpredictable, stormy atmosphere brewing amongst the wedding guests.
The story grips you from the start when a body is found without revealing anything to us at that point as to who it is. Then, flipping between the perspectives of five different characters and two different timelines, the author spends the rest of the time working through the past 48 hours to reveal more about these characters- their lies, secrets, grief, guilt, resentments and jealousies - to establish five possible suspects and motives before the big reveal at the end. Not only could I not work out who'd dunnit, I was also left guessing who'd even been murdered right until the end.
But, both of these things were also what I disliked about this book. The jumping back and forth of narrative left my head spinning and struggling to keep up at times, especially in the beginning. Many people read this genre of book in one sitting and I imagine that would've actually helped in this case. Likewise the complexly flawed characters were actually spoiled the book for me in that I simply didn't like, relate to or care about any of them.
Similarly, whilst I loved that there were five intertwined motives and suspects to keep you guessing, the coincidences that connected them pushed the boundaries of believability and acceptability just a bit too far.
So, all-in-all a fun, compulsive read that's all about the tantalisingly slow build-up and unexpected reveal.
No comments:
Post a Comment