Wednesday, September 4, 2019

BOOK: Someone We Know by Shari Lapena

Someone We Know by Shari Lapena, 330 pages

Shari Lapena joins Linwood Barclay as a very reliable Canadian suspense author. I listened to Lapena's first book, The Couple Next Door, back in November 2016, and loved the twists and turns of the story. For no good reason, I missed reading her next two books, but I am jumping all over her latest release, Someone We Know.

I may not want to live in the neighbourhood described in this book, but it was a lot of fun to read about it! Everyone has secrets and hidden lives and everyone lies, which makes for many interesting revelations. If people would just tell the truth, it would make life so much easier for the detectives, but so less interesting for the reader.

I don't want to give any plot away, and I find these types of books have plots that blend together somewhat. I will devour the book while I read it, but couldn't tell you who did what, a month after reading the book. I don't take this as a negative; part of the problem is that I read them too fast, trying to find out what happens next!

ETA: I started writing this review right after reading the book, and now, over a month later, I do remember what happened, and who killed the lady, and why. So, these books are memorable!

Because I did enjoy this book, I borrowed one of Lapena's back list titles, and just finished listening to it. An Unwanted Guest was a terrific locked room type of mystery. It very much put me to mind of And Then There Were None by Agatha Christie, and I was quite annoyed that I couldn't remember how that one actually turned out. An Unwanted Guest has a number of couples, and a few singles, arriving at an isolated hotel, just as a blizzard strikes. The power goes out, there is no internet or telephone, and someone turns up dead on Saturday morning. And then another,...

I think what makes these books so readable is there are a number of plausible suspects, and Lapena varies her point of view, so the reader gets inside the heads of some of the characters. I feels like I can predict what happens, but in reality, I have about seven possible outcomes and suspects as the red herrings are flying, and obviously, eventually, I 'know' who did it. I am terrible at predicting the murderer, or I am really good, because I expect it could be anyone, lol.

I now just have A Stranger in the House to read from Lapena, and I expect to get to that sooner rather than later, what with this being the RIP season of fall spooky reading.