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alouette 's review for:

An Unwanted Guest by Shari Lapena
2.25
dark mysterious tense slow-paced
Strong character development: No
Loveable characters: No
Diverse cast of characters: No
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

2.25 stars

enough intrigue to keep me reading until the end, but it almost felt like there were *too many* red herrings. i think that when a mystery has to be explained so much that the entire last chapter reads like one big expository essay, it maybe isn’t a good mystery. one could read the last two chapters and bam, they know everything that’s happened- everything else, including the bland characters and the aforementioned red herrings, doesn’t matter. i found no enjoyment or surprise when the culprit was revealed, which is unfortunate, because i thought this story so reminiscent of And Then There Were None had lots of potential.