Thoughts on : An Unwanted Guest by Shari Lapena

Posted by Kay on January 29, 2019 1:14 pm in 4 stars reads | 2 comments

An Unwanted Guest by Shari Lapena
Genre : Mystery
Stand alone

About the Book  :

A remote lodge in upstate New York is the perfect getaway. . . until the bodies start piling up.

 

It’s winter in the Catskills and the weather outside is frightful. But Mitchell’s Inn is so delightful! The cozy lodge nestled deep in the woods is perfect for a relaxing–maybe even romantic–weekend away. The Inn boasts spacious old rooms with huge wood-burning fireplaces, a well-stocked wine cellar, and opportunities for cross-country skiing, snowshoeing, or just curling up with a book and someone you love. So when the weather takes a turn for the worse, and a blizzard cuts off the electricity–and all contact with the outside world–the guests settle in for the long haul.

 

Soon, though, a body turns up–surely an accident. When a second body appears, they start to panic. Then they find a third body. Within the snowed-in paradise, something–or someone–is picking off the guests one by one. They can’t leave, and with no cell service, there’s no prospect of getting the police in until the weather loosens its icy grip. The weekend getaway has turned deadly. And there’s nothing they can do about it but huddle down and hope they can survive the storm.

My Thoughts :

Mystery novels, especially of the psychological thrillers variety, are some of my favorite books, and so I read a lot of them. Unfortunately, many of the thrillers I read in 2018 were disappointing, and very few stood out. An Unwanted Guest is one of those few.

It seems as though Shari Lapena knows exactly how to hook me in, because I had found her previous thrillers (The Couple Next Door and A Stranger in the House) just as entertaining. Once more, I was immediately engrossed and felt like I was there, trapped in that inn during the snowstorm – although, I did read it during a snowstorm where we lost power for half a day, recreating the book’s chilling atmosphere (sans murders, of course).

An Unwanted Guest offers a good mystery, the kind that constantly keeps you guessing. The book alternates between the points of view of all the guests who, with a few exceptions, I all found interesting and intriguing. You quickly find yourself trying to determine who’s lying or not, and there’s just enough clues to keep you on your toes. And while I didn’t find the final reveal of “Who did it” to be surprising, I felt it was a very satisfying one.

I don’t have much to say, because An Unwanted Guest was simply an entertaining novel I enjoyed from beginning to (almost) end. Yes, there is an additional twist/mystery revealed after the conclusion, which I found unnecessary. It’s something I had also noted in my review of The Couple Next Door, and that was also present in A Stranger in the House (though I liked this one a little better). I think it’s  time to accept that Shari Lapena simply can’t go without the luxury of an extra twist, and that it will probably conclude her future novels too – which I’ll make sure to read!