The Guest List

My reading has been quite sporadic this month.  I had a knee replacement in the middle of this month and thought that I would then have plenty of time for reading. Sadly, that didn't happen. I found it hard to focus on a book. I tried to read two books and gave up on them, but that took away five nights of reading that felt wasted!

You have probably come across references to The Guest List by Lucy Foley. I waited two months to get it from the library! I had/have mixed reactions to the book.  First of all, I thought that it was about discovering who had murdered who. So that threw me off the book for a bit, but I stuck with it.

The story is about a wedding that is happening on an island off of Ireland.  It is a several day event.  The main male characters were schoolmates of the groom.  The female characters were a more diverse group: the bride's sister, the wife of one of the bride's old friends, and the wedding planner who also owned (with her husband) the venue spot and did the catering.

As you can probably imagine, with a group like that, much was happening.  Lots of old secrets revealed, along with some unspoken regrets and grievances.

The author did a wonderful job with character development.  It was easy for the reader to know each character in depth. I really appreciated that each chapter that was narrated by one of the characters had not only the person's name as the title, but also told who the character was in the story. And she did a nice job wrapping the story up at the end.

I have been thinking about the book since I finished it a few days ago.  It's a good read!