“Emily Hunt disappeared on the Saturday of graduation weekend. No one noticed until Sunday afternoon.”
The Engagement Party, Darby Kane
The only thing better than a locked room mystery is a locked island mystery. Add in a terrible storm, power outages, and a twenty-year-old murder, and you have a perfect thriller. Three couples are staying together on an island to celebrate an engagement. Will is engaged to Ruthie, and has invited his college friends Alex, Cassie, and Mitch. Alex and Cassie are married, and Mitch brought his longtime work partner Sierra. While the group tries to focus on celebrating the newly engaged couple, it seems someone has other plans. The college friends are forced to reckon with the murder of their friend Emily Hunt, who died the night before graduation, as someone begins to torment the group for more information.
I flew through this book. All locked-room mysteries follow the same basic formula, and this is no exception. The added twist from the beginning is Emily’s murder. The characters were hurrying to figure out who was pulling the strings on their weekend while I was hurrying to figure out how Emily died. The dual suspense kept me completely on my toes, and made the story fly by even quicker. The three main POVs come from Sierra, Ruthie, and Alex. Sierra and Ruthie are complete outsiders, and lean on each other as a voice of reason. Alex is married to Cassie, and is part of the original gang of college friends.
One con was that with a group of six characters, most of them ended up feeling a little flat and one-dimensional. The other, bigger, con was that the ending didn’t feel as neat and tidy as it seemed. Yes, I got an answer for all the main questions. But it felt like there wasn’t enough of a bridge between everything the characters lied about and what the truth actually was.
Ready for my full review (with spoilers)? Continue reading here!
Overall, this book is a wild ride. It’s ridiculous, but it’s so fast-paced and intense that none of that seems to matter. I flew through it, and felt like I’d run a marathon. But with that much plot packed into 400 pages, the characters are pretty much just plot devices. There’s a little background for each of them (Sierra loves Mitch, Will is a douche, etc.), but nothing substantial or personalized. There’s very little motivation for any of them. Also, once the plot goes Scooby-Doo, it doesn’t really make its way back. Every scene felt like a waiting game for a bomb to go off, with no breaks in between. However, both of these issues are common issues with locked room mysteries, so it wasn’t a total turn-off for me.
If you’re looking for something to grab your attention and keep you entertained, this is the perfect book for you!
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