Thank you to NetGalley for providing me with a digital version of this book in return for an honest review.
🌟🌟 The Guest Room by Tasha Sylva
Tess’s sister has been found dead on Hampstead Heath and her killer still hasn’t been found one year later. Tess has moved into her house and started working in her sister's old job at a gallery hoping it will give her some insight into Rose’s life and why she was murdered.
She starts to do B&B to clear some debts and this is how she meets Arran Cole, her new tenant for the next month. Tess has a secret; she gets a thrill from snooping into her guest's possessions. While poking around his belongings she comes across Arran’s diary and learns about the woman he is stalking. She follows him to find out more and in turn, becomes a stalker herself. She stalks him, the girl he is following, Oliver, his sister's ex-boyfriend, and even once the girl Oliver went on a date with.
At one point I thought I was watching an episode of Benny Hill with people stalking each other all over the place. All we needed was the funny music. On one occasion there were three people stalking each other at once.
There were lots of things that didn’t add up in this story for me. I felt the author just didn’t join up the dots and I considered it all a bit disjointed at times. One of these instances was when Tess thought she was the woman that Arran was stalking. How could this be? Did she not remember her movements the last few days and correspond them to those Aran recorded? There were many examples of completely unrealistic scenarios.
I felt the ending was so disappointing and did a massive eye roll when I discovered who Roses’s killer was.
I found this story monotonic and repetitive with very unlikeable, bizarre characters such as Luke and Elliot. I don’t think we ever did find out why Elliot was always acting so weird around Tess.
Unfortunately, this wasn’t a winner for me. This was a debut so first attempt. I do think this author has potential so I would like to see what comes next. Have you read this book? What did you think?
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