An Unwanted Guest - Shari Lapena

An Unwanted Guest by Shari Lapena

First Paragraph(s):

Friday, 4:45 p.m.

The road curves and twists unexpectedly as it leads higher and deeper into the Catskill Mountains, as if the farther you get from civilization, the more uncertain the path.  The shadows are deepening, the weather worsening.  The Hudson River is there, appearing and disappearing from view.  The forest that rises on either side of the road has a lurking quality, as if it might swallow you whole; it is the forest of fairy tales.  The softly falling snow, however, lends it all a certain postcard charm.
     Gwen Delaney grips the steering wheel tightly and squints through the windshield.  She's more one for grim fairy tales than picture postcards.  The light is going; it will soon be dark.  The snow coming down makes driving more difficult, more tiring.  The flakes hit the glass in such profusion that she feels as though she's stuck in some kind of relentless video game.  And the road is definitely becoming more slippery.  She's grateful that she has good tires on her little Fiat.  Everything is turning into a white blur; it's hard to tell where the road ends and the ditch begins.  She'll be glad when they get there.  She's beginning to wish they'd chosen an inn a little less remote; this one is miles from anywhere.

My Thoughts:

An Unwanted Guest comes out today in the US and I liked it - quite a lot, actually.  I'm always up for a good 'locked room' mystery, and it doesn't hurt that this one also has some aspects of Agatha Christie's famous play, The Mousetrap.  It's not the same - let's say that right off the bat - but there are some similarities.  A winter storm, a bunch of characters that are heading to a remote guest inn, being cut off because of the weather, lots of secrets, and then, of course, bodies.  Is it murder or accident?  If murder, is the killer from outside or here among us?  I love this!  A puzzle within a puzzle.

I read Shari Lapena's first book, The Couple Next Door, and liked it.  I haven't read her second, A Stranger in the House, as yet.  However, I'll do that before long and I'll be watching for what she'll write next.  If you like Christie's way of telling a story, I suspect you might like this one too.  It's contemporary, but not too horribly gruesome.  Yes, I guessed the ending, but that never bothers me.  It makes me feel like a good detective.  If you decide to read it, I'll be curious what you think.   

Blurb:

It's winter in the Catskills and Mitchell's Inn, nestled deep in the woods, is the perfect setting for a relaxing--maybe even romantic--weekend away. It boasts spacious old rooms with huge woodburning fireplaces, a well-stocked wine cellar, and opportunities for cross-country skiing, snowshoeing, or just curling up with a good murder mystery.

So when the weather takes a turn for the worse, and a blizzard cuts off the electricity--and all contact with the outside world--the guests settle in for the long haul.

Soon, though, one of the guests turns up dead--it looks like an accident. But when a second guest dies, they start to panic.

Within the snowed-in paradise, something--or someone--is picking off the guests one by one. And there's nothing they can do but hunker down and hope they can survive the storm.