Book Review
Title: The Guest List
Author: Lucy Foley
Genre: Mystery/Thriller
Rating: *****
Review: The Guest List is part of my 2020 Goodreads Reading Challenge, and I am known to love mystery thrillers especially when they are done right, and the premise of the Guest List seems right up my alley. All I knew about this book was it follows a wedding and a death; it is also told in alternating timelines and perspectives and as I am a fan of Riley Sager’s work I was really hoping to enjoy this book. The opening chapter was interesting as it introduces us to a wedding on an island in the middle of a terrible storm with electrical problems but all that is overshadowed by a scream. We then jump back to the day before and we are follow Aoife, the wedding planner. Aoife is orchestrating the wedding between Will Slater and Julia Keegan, two very famous people in their folly off the course of Dublin along with her partner/husband, Freddy. Aoife does mention in her chapter that the bride and groom haven’t been together for very long and that when they heard them in the throes of passion the night before that it sounded a lot like pain which might be some clues to what happens later on, but we change perspective to that of Hannah, the plus one. Hannah is the wife of Charlie who is a close friend of Jules, the bride and on the boat ride over to the island we learn that Charlie feels that Will is hiding something about himself and we also learn that something might have happen during the stag-do in Sweden but Charlie refuses to take about it. We then switch perspective again to Jules, the bride. Jules’ chapter was the most interesting yet as we learn the kind of person she is and the relationship she has with Will. However, a note she received a few weeks before telling her not to marry Will has her worried and she is also concerned about Johnno, the best man, as Will keeps him around because of their history and Jules thinks that history must have some hold over Will, and I am inclined to agree right now but we switch to Johnno’s perspective.
Johnno allows us to get to know Will through him as we learn about his upbringing and how he had a difficult relationship with his father, but he had his friends which got him through it. However, Johnno harbours a huge amount of jealousy, partly towards Will for being better than him but also towards Jules for taking Will away from him in a sense and we can see that he might be confirming Jules’ suspicion about their past since he says that he knows the most about Will. However, we know turn to Olivia, Jules’ half-sister and only bridesmaid who Will describes as fragile in the previous chapter. Olivia is quite emotionally fragile right now as she is self-harming as we don’t know why, all we know is something happened with her ex-boyfriend that has also led to her dropping out of university and she also feels quite resentful towards Jules and we don’t know why yet. We soon learn that there are a lot of secrets and resentments between the guests, just as an example, we learn that Olivia used to have a crush on Charlie which might not have gone away, and that Hannah has some suspicions that Charlie and Jules might be in a having an affair which doesn’t seem likely since Jules seems completely happy with Will. We can see there is something going on with Jules and Charlie when they are interrupted by Aoife, but it isn’t her job to comment on that. When we jump back to the wedding night, one of the waitresses stumbles in from the storm declaring she has found a body outside, we don’t know the identity of the body, but it must have been violent as she tells them there is a lot of blood, which makes it seem like foul play.
As we continue to get the know the people on the island, I was beginning to get the feeling that something is terrible wrong with this group and it only intensifies by the time we reach the rehearsal dinner. Hannah is sure that something is going on between Jules and Charlie and she can feels Will’s roaming eye passing over her more than once over the course of the night, but this is dampened by the way Charlie seems to change around Jules. When Jules’ father, Ronan arrives this get even more chilly as he doesn’t have a good relationship with Jules’ mother, and he has also brought along his new partner who mentions the fact their twins are getting ready to start nursery. We can feel the tension building throughout the night and it has me wondering who is the person that could have been killed and who did it. Back in the present, Aoife doesn’t want anyone else wandering about the island since it is pretty dangerous between the bogs, cliffs, and the awful weather but everyone seems determined to check on the person who the waitress saw. As the rehearsal dinner, dissolves into drinking games we see Hannah and Olivia are forming an unlikely bond and that Hannah’s marriage to Charlie might not be as perfect as it seems. Back in the present, the four ushers are heading out to figure out if there is some truth in the waitress’ claims but we can feel the energy of the night has shifted into something darker and more ominous than before but we get glimpses of this in the night too as the boys’ drink and Hannah has to leave because of the atmosphere.
As the night draws on, we begin to see none of the characters are as perfect as they make themselves out to be. We learn that Olivia had a relationship with a much older man after her breakup which ended badly but possibly much worse than Olivia confides in Hannah. We see that Jules still harbours some attractions to Charlie and she is hurt when he rebuffs her and we see that Johnno might have something far darker hiding in his closest much like Will as the note Jules received called him a cheat and a liar which makes me think that it might have come from someone within the wedding party who slept with Will during his relationship with Jules and is trying to warn her of what is to come but I can’t shake the suspicion that it may have also come from someone like Johnno or one of the other ushers. As the guests begin to rise on the morning of the wedding, the ominous and dark tone continues to build and we begin feeling a little off about some of the characters especially the ushers as they sit and watch Hannah being sucked down into the bog before offering the help her and making what she feels are advances towards her. This isn’t uncommon as we see Johnno making advances towards Olivia the night before and Will even has an interaction with Aoife that she deems inappropriate but she can’t say anything about it as it would be unprofessional for her to do so. As the wedding gets underway, we can see the discontent building as Jules is having doubts which are only solidified as her father’s first impression of Will wasn’t good and even Hannah notices her frightened look as she enters the chapel although it quickly disappears. As the main event is over and the party gets underway, Hannah realises Charlie has been drinking and we see another side to him emerge but we know from the chapter in the present that something is going on with Freddy who has been an unassuming character so far and Duncan says that Olivia was acting like she was trying to off herself, so honestly, I have no idea where the story is going right now.
As things begin to really pick up small secrets about the characters begin to emerge, that something awful happened on the stag do which changed Charlie, that Johnno stole Will’s GCSE results since he didn’t do any work at school and Will’s father covered it up along with the death of another student caused by the group. The secret that hurt me the most was Olivia’s as we learn she found out she was pregnant after being ghosted by Steven and her mother had to take her for an abortion which continues to haunt her until this day and Steven did and said nothing during this time when she was extremely vulnerable which leads Olivia to walk into the sea and she almost drowns. We can feel the pace really picking up now and with just over 100 pages left I don’t know what Foley has in store for me but I am excited to find out. Afterwards Will rescues Olivia from her drowning where Hannah begins to confide in her about the suicide of her sister although she doesn’t get to that part in her story. Quickly off the back of this we can assume that the new grave Hannah saw earlier on the island belong to Aoife and Freddy’s child who drowned as Olivia’s incident nearly send Aoife into a panic attack. The two real kickers for me were learning that Will deliberately made sure that Johnno wasn’t part of the show despite being wanted for it as Piers explains and he vows to get him back and that Steven, the man Olivia dated and got pregnant by and Will are the same person. Right now, I am hoping the body found is Will’s but if it isn’t then I am praying that the perfect house of cards Will has built around himself crumbles into dust because he deserves it more than anyone despite the other characters being less than perfect.
Slowly bigger and bigger secrets are revealed as first Charlie revealed he slept with Jules after the birth of their son Ben, while Hannah was dealing with post-natal depression and waiting for her stitches to heal and she walks away from him. Will is also cornered by Johnno who explains that they killed a boy while they were at school and although Johnno didn’t think about the consequences at the time, he know Will intended to kill the boy to protect himself from being expelled and having his life fall apart around him and Johnno swears he is going to expose Will. Olivia also tells Will that she is going to tell Jules about them but realises she can’t because she loves her sister but unaware to the both of them Jules has been listening the whole time. We then jump back to the present where the ushers have come across Jules’ crown, broken, and bent out of shape and one of Olivia’s shoes and none of them can remember seeing Jules after the power came back on but one mentions Jules being angry or frightened as she cut the cake, presumably because of the secrets being revealed. I am praying that both sisters banding together with Johnno to kill Will because honestly this asshole deserves it. It then comes out that Will dated Hannah’s sister, Alice and he posted the sex video online that caused her to kill herself so now four people are gunning for Will. By the time we reach the end of this novel and we finally see who has died and who committed the murder I was no expecting all the twists and turns this ending held despite the first half of the book being a slow burn. Honestly, I think the Guest List is one of my favourite mystery thrillers of the year up there will Lock Every Door and Home Before Dark by Riley Sager and it definitely deserved to win. I also read this book in one sitting because it was just so gripping and I am definitely going to read the Hunting Party.
Buy it here:
Paperback/Hardcover: amazon.co.uk amazon.com
Kindle Edition: amazon.co.uk amazon.com
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