Why oh why do I keep reading books I don’t like? Is this a naïve hope that at some point in the book the story will get better or the characters more agreeable?

I couldn’t really get into this one. For a start, there are too many characters in most scenes. Sure, there’s a wedding party of eight (and they all arrive together) and there is staff, each with different tasks, to assist the guest, but did all of these people need to be introduced (name and description of physical attributes and other tokens) in the same scene?

There’s a level of detail in the descriptions that distracts from the main action. While the police are securing the possible crime scene the narrative says:

His pale fingers had a dusting of blond hair.

It was around midnight and cloudy; how could anyone have noticed this?

Then one of the guests gets killed. And all the guests turn out to be rather unlikeable people. Jake (and his entourage) seem to be more concerned with how publicity concerning the wedding will affect his career than with the feelings of his bride. Apperently, Jake is stuck in some kind of studio system where a pregnancy could ruin his career. (He’s a man! Doing action movies. It’s not like his belly will get in the way of being kick-ass. His fan base probably does not care either.)

Rayne and Ciara want to make their ancestral home into a money maker by turning it into a wedding venue. With you on that one: castles for weddings is a romcom trope. For some reason it means the participate in all activities of the guests. Why? It’s not like the guests were impressed with having an actual Lady at their table, nor did Rayne and Ciara strike up some rapport with the guests that enabled them to snoop to solve the mystery.

For that matter, very little snooping is done. Rayne is mostly concerned with altering a wedding dress and sorting through other last minute wedding stress, and speculating about who could have killed Tiffany (and speculating about who has sexual or romantic interest in who).

The twist were the motive becomes clear was a surprise, but at the same time rather pathetic.

Spoiler

“I’ve been trying to get a divorce for years from my first wife, but she refuses to grant me one.”

In California you can get a divorce even if the other person doesn't want one. No need to ask the wife. All that is required is that he has lived in California for the last six months.

Except for the phones with camera and the mention of wifi, a lot of things made it seem like this story was set in the 1950s

Spoiler

(the studio system, the wife’s permission to get divorced).

I read an ARC through NetGalley.