Why didn’t The Perfect Guests work for me? This book has all the elements of a good suspense novel, and even the elements I particularly like (Falling-down estate, Is this a game or not?, Oh no! We’ve been cut off from civilization! etc.).

I think it’s because the first half of the book is everyone just wandering around being ominous and creepy. There aren’t any real hints at secrets, besides that the house is creepy and something weird is going on. I felt a dispiriting lack of progress in the beginning, once we’ve established that something weird is going on, the tension doesn’t quite grow from there.  The second half is shocking revelations coming fast and thick, some of which were fun twists but many were weirdly unsatisfying, relying on people who knew each other pretty well not recognizing each other, or characters we met 5 seconds ago suddenly revealing a deep secret.

The real mystery for me was not the secret of Raven Hall, but why a book with everything I like in a suspense novel fell so flat.