The Guest List

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Manufacturer: Lucy Foley
Brand: Thriller
Brew: Paperback
Steeping Time: 313 pages
Tea Service: Personal Choice
Strength:

Synopsis: The bride – The plus one – The best man – The wedding planner – The bridesmaid – The body

On an island off the coast of Ireland, guests gather to celebrate two people joining their lives together as one. The groom: handsome and charming, a rising television star. The bride: smart and ambitious, a magazine publisher. It’s a wedding for a magazine, or for a celebrity: the designer dress, the remote location, the luxe party favors, the boutique whiskey. The cell phone service may be spotty and the waves may be rough, but every detail has been expertly planned and will be expertly executed.

But perfection is for plans, and people are all too human. As the champagne is popped and the festivities begin, resentments and petty jealousies begin to mingle with the reminiscences and well wishes. The groomsmen begin the drinking game from their school days. The bridesmaid not-so-accidentally ruins her dress. The bride’s oldest (male) friend gives an uncomfortably caring toast.

And then someone turns up dead. Who didn’t wish the happy couple well? And perhaps more important, why?

Ask any bride what they are most afraid of at their wedding day and you’ll get a pretty standard answer.

The cake falling over, the groom fainting, a toddler ring bearer or flower girl who collapses into tantrums halfway down the aisle. The list is endless. But I can near about guarantee you that the list doesn’t contain the fear of a murder ruining the big day.

Welcome to The Guest List, where the setting couldn’t be more perfect and a wedding couldn’t possibly go more wrong.

I’ve read one other book by Lucy Foley, The Hunting Party, and as I started this one, I could see that she definitely has a formula that she follows. There are multiple viewpoints, an intricately woven story, and a life’s worth of secrets. I didn’t enjoy The Hunting Party as much as I’d hoped, so I was nervous going into The Guest List. I worried that I’d have the same result. But I couldn’t have been more wrong.

The characters of The Guest List are well-rounded and complex. Some of them are easily likable, others are just as easy to hate. And then there are a few that fall in the middle, holding too many secrets to make a snap judgment about. The POVs switch easily from chapter to chapter, and the pace is steady throughout the book. I never found myself bored or wanting to speed things up. Lucy Foley does an incredible job of keeping the tension up and then giving you a slight breather before it all gets to be too much. This was a page-turner!

The major thing I liked about The Guest List over The Hunting Party is that I actually liked many of the characters.

I found myself rooting for quite a few of them and it was nice to have someone to get behind. So many of the characters are relatable and they come off as very genuine. With The Hunting Party, I had a hard time connecting with the characters, so this was a wonderful change.

I read the last third or so of the book in one sitting, staying up late into the night, refusing to put it down. While I thoroughly enjoyed the book, it didn’t quite hit the five-cuppa rating mark, and I’m not sure why. I can’t quite put my finger on what the book was lacking, but I did feel that it could have been longer. We get a deep dive on a lot of the characters, but I still could have used more. It was a great read, and a very entertaining one, but not one that will stick with me for days and days.

I generally judge a five-cuppa book on the time it takes me to pick up another book. If I can immediately move on to something else, I give it four cuppas. But if I have to sit with it for a few days and really process the story, then it warrants five cuppas. In all, it’s four cuppas for The Guest List, but don’t let that deter you from reading this gem of a thriller.

If you’re looking for a suspenseful mystery that is sure to keep you glued to the pages, I think you’ll enjoy The Guest List. It has great Agatha Christie vibes and hits all of the mystery checkboxes.

Have you read The Guest List? Leave a comment and let me know what you thought about it! Want to read it for yourself? Click here to get a copy of your own.
Cheers,
Lydia