Gotta love a thriller that delivers on the surprises!

Nine-year-old Avery Wooler is missing. Her parents are frantic and want her found. But in this small neighborhood, secrets abound, and not everyone is willing to share theirs in order to help find Avery. And is so often the case, the biggest secrets tend to lie closest to home.

Shari Lapena writes stories across the gamut of the mystery/thriller genre. Some of her stories are more of mysteries, with clues galore where you can suss out the culprit. Not this one. I would categorize this as more of a neighborhood thriller. There are no real clues to follow, but there are plenty of surprises. Just when you think you've got a grip on what's going on, the story changes on you and you have to start again. It's great fun.

I always enjoy Lapena's writing style. It's sparse and action-driven, without a lot of emotional or psychological fluff that is common to the genre. Instead, there's an ease and energy to the writing that keeps you wanting to read just one more page. And before you know you it, you've reached the end.

And what an end it was. It's quite coy, winking at the reader and implying a certain conclusion. Usually I don't mind using my own imagination to fill in the blanks, but in this case, I wanted that certainty. I wish there had been one more chapter to spell it all out so I could get the satisfaction of seeing the villain get what they deserve. But that's a pretty small quibble overall.

Shari Lapena has definitely become a must-read author for me. While I didn't love this one quite as much as Someone We Know and Not a Happy Family (both more of a mystery with clues and red herrings), I did have a lot of fun with it. It hit the perfect spot for an unputdownable thriller.

Readaroo Rating: 4 stars

My heartfelt thanks for the copy that was provided for my honest and unbiased review.

The truth is, they're all so much better off now that their parents have been murdered.

The Mertons gather for Easter dinner, and it's a dreadful experience for almost everyone involved. The only one having fun is patriarch Fred Merton, who particularly enjoys bullying every member of his family, including his wife and his three grown children. So when Fred and his wife are gruesomely murdered later that night, no one is really surprised. Any of his children would gladly have done it, or was it someone else altogether who hates their father even more?

This story had me hooked from the very first page. I love Lapena's writing style here, which is sparse and to the point. It doesn't contain any unnecessary fluff or overwrought musings, so it jives well with the genre, enabling the action to take the front seat. Every page contains some crucial new development, so I always feel compelled to read just a few more pages.

The characters are unlikable but relatable. After all, who hasn't occasionally indulged in a bit of fantasy wishing an irksome relative would just go away. (No one? Oh, how awkward.) The contradiction between their complicated emotions—happiness that their father is out of their lives, shock that one of their siblings might be a murderer, and frightened of what the police would find out—creates this tension in the story that is both uncomfortable and entertaining.

The mystery proceeds like a whodunnit, with clues slowly uncovered and red herrings galore. If you've read mysteries before, the big reveal at the end probably won't shock you. For me, though, the highlight is all the little twists and turns leading up to it. They were so deliciously fun, and kept the pacing taut and brisk. Just when I think I've got it all figured out, a new surprise has me reconsidering everything.

I've read quite a few Shari Lapena books now, and I have a bit of a love/hate relationship with them. I think I've finally figured out that I adore her mysteries (someone is killed and there are multiple suspects), while I don't like her domestic thrillers (husband or wife could be lying, so are they or aren't they). This mystery definitely goes onto my list of favorites from her.

Readaroo Rating: 4 stars

"You're a liar! I'm going to tell on you!"

"I'm not the liar... you are! Liar liar, pants on fire!"

Ok, that's not actual dialogue from the book, but it might as well have been.

Patrick and Stephanie are enjoying life as new parents with their colicky twins, when some woman shows up and claims that Patrick killed his first wife. The shock! She demands money for her silence, of course. Instead of going to the police with this threat, the couple decides to fight back by engaging in a Who's the Bigger Liar contest with the blackmailer. After that, all hell breaks loose.

You guys, sometimes I don't even know what I'm reading anymore. Have domestic thrillers lost all sense of reality? Don't go to the police when randos threaten you; you should talk them out of it instead! Getting blackmailed over something minor or false? Best to freak out and give in! And accusing someone of murder? You just need evidence of an affair and a life insurance policy!

Where is the logic in here? No one behaves like this, I tell you! And yet, this book is full of these loonies, and we are forced to read about them overreacting to every little thing, having paranoid breakdowns, and making one bad decision after another. Nothing they did or said made any sense. My eyes rolled so hard I was seriously afraid of permanent damage.

Then, as I'm getting towards the end of the book, a thought popped into my head: "You know what would totally cement the insanity? If this happened." And guess what... that was indeed the big twist of the story. So I didn't even get to enjoy the surprise after all that.

Honestly, what a completely silly, nonsensical, ridiculous story this turned out to be.

Readaroo Rating: 2 stars

I've really come to enjoy Shari Lapena's writing style, and for me, this is her best story yet.

Someone We Know takes place in a tranquil suburb of New York. Robert Pierce reports that his beautiful young wife Amanda is missing. Did she leave on her own or has something sinister happened to her? The police arrive in the neighborhood, and proceed to unearth the residents' every secret. And there are so many, because everyone has something to hide.

Lapena has the most interesting style. It's sparse and action-driven, so it feels like something is happening with every sentence. There are no unnecessary descriptions, no overwrought emotion, no dilly-dallying or indulgence. Every page is stripped to only the most essential, so the pacing feels taut and brisk. It makes for a riveting read, leaving me to turn the pages as fast as I could.

The mystery itself plays out like a whodunit, with plenty of suspects among a small pool of characters, and red herrings galore. Each character has secrets they want to keep hidden, and as those are revealed one by one, the twists and turns make for a truly entertaining read.

I actually sniffed out where this was going earlier on, but there were still plenty of twists I didn't see coming that kept me guessing till the very end. My only small gripe is that not everything was explained; there was a small point left purposefully unclear and I had been looking forward to its explanation.

This is one of the most fun contemporary mysteries I've come across. Usually I find this genre to be a complete disappointment, with all the drama coming from characters boozing and acting crazy and confused. Thank goodness this book doesn't employ such cheap tricks. It reads like a breath of fresh air. Shari Lapena has been getting better with each of her books, and I can't wait to read more from her.

Readaroo Rating: 4 stars

There's something about mysteries that take place in secluded locations, I just can't resist.

Guests are checking into a small lodge in the middle of nowhere, looking forward to a romantic and relaxing time. Alas, a winter storm blows through, knocking out power and contact with the outside world. One person dies by what seems to be accidental means, but when a second person dies, it's clear something sinister is afoot. Is it one of the guests, or is there an unknown, mysterious interloper on the loose?

This was a bit of a mixed bag for me. On the one hand, I found the premise and initial setup thoroughly intriguing. Just like the best Golden Age mysteries, there is a limited set of suspects, and everyone is acting questionable and hiding something. In fact, the cover of the book compares this to Agatha Christie, which is high aspiration indeed.

But unfortunately, after the great start, the mystery didn't really come together the way I was expecting. What's amazing about Agatha Christie is that all the clues are there, and when it's explained in the end, you feel like you could have figured it all out if only you'd been a little bit more clever. But with this story, there were no clues for me to put together and solve, and the reasons became known only when the book chose to reveal it. That takes a lot of the fun out of the mystery, at least for me.

Another letdown is that the characters act all panicked and wacky, which leads to more drama than is necessary. I've noticed that this is a trend of modern mysteries, where instead of offering great clues and red herrings, a lot of them just have characters acting crazy as the element that propels the story along. In fact, there were a few weirdly emotional characters who I was hoping would get murdered to be rid of their annoying presence.

Still, if you don't go in expecting a mystery with actual clues, then this is an adequate one. The setting is atmospheric, the premise is interesting, and the unfolding of the plot is engrossing enough. I'm glad I picked it up, even if the mystery didn't quite live up to its potential.

Readaroo Rating: 3 stars

This story starts out strong. A baby is kidnapped while the parents are next door at a party. Who could have taken her? Everyone involved has secrets, so many secrets. A competent detective is assigned to the case, and he immediately starts to suspect the parents.

Then as secrets are revealed, twists and turns appear, more and more of them, until they are so convoluted and twisting onto themselves that all sense of realism and believability is lost. Towards the end, it's hard to relate to any of the characters anymore or understand anyone's motivations or actions.

I did enjoy the author's writing style. It's sparse and action-driven, so it feels like the suspense level is high throughout, at least stylistically if not content-wise. And it contributes to a speedy pace.

And then we come to the gobsmacked ending. See, the story had already finished and everything was wrapped up. And then for some inexplicable reason, the author decided to keep going for an additional chapter, just to throw something shocking in at the end, except that it makes no sense and is completely ridiculous! Yikes... the author should have stopped while she was ahead.

Readaroo Rating: 2 stars