I received this book for free (hey, thanks!) in exchange for an honest review. I promise that this does NOT affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review. For real.
The Examiner by Janice Hallett Genres: Adult, Mystery/Thriller
Published by Simon and Schuster on September 10, 2024
Also by this author: The Appeal, The Christmas Appeal , The Mysterious Case of the Alperton Angels, The Twyford Code
Format: eARC (480 pages) • Source: Publisher
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Told in emails, text messages, and essays, this innovative page-turner follows a group of students in an art master’s program that goes dangerously awry, from the internationally bestselling “new queen of crime” (Electric Literature) Janice Hallett.
University professor Gela Nathaniel must make her new master’s program in multimedia art succeed. If it doesn’t, then Royal Hastings University will cut her funding and she’ll be out of the job she loves. The six students in this inaugural course will be key to that success…but how well has she selected the team?
The students include a talented young sculptor who is determined to graduate with top grades, a former gallery owner with limited artistic skills, a single mother more interested in a paycheck than homework, a people pleaser who struggles with technology, a marketing executive suffering from burnout, and a successful artist who seems rather overqualified for the program.
At the end of the academic year, when the examiner arrives to grade the students’ final project, he finds himself asking what happened. Because if someone in that course isn’t in mortal danger, then they are already dead. But who, and why?
He wants us to read through the students’ coursework, texts, message boards, and final essays to see if we can find the answers. Only one thing is certain: nothing about this course has been left to chance, and each of these students has their own very different agenda.
Janice Hallett has very quickly become an auto-buy author for me. I’m now officially caught up on all her books (sad!) because I completed her backlist before diving into her new release, THE EXAMINER. Hallett always writes in mixed media or epistolary format so you spend a lot of the initial pages wondering where all of these emails or texts or audio notes will take you.
THE EXAMINER is much of the same, except for a little bit longer… It takes a while to figure out what the mystery actually is. The premise is a bunch of students are taking a Masters course in art at a college and something goes haywire, or someone goes missing, or someone dies. You don’t really know right away as the messages are just the students getting to know each other and eventually having disagreements.
The story evolves into a lot of wild revelations. I’ve always thought some of Hallett’s premises are a bit far-fetched (primarily the TWYFORD CODE in some ways as well as ALPERTON ANGELS). That hasn’t affected my enjoyment of these books though, as one of them was five stars. I will admit that the EXAMINER was a bit too wild for me. It didn’t feel realistic that all of this would actually happen. I’m not saying all of my books need to be super realistic (ex: I read cozy mysteries or books like FINLAY DONOVAN where the amateur sleuth figures complex mysteries out) but with each reveal and twist, I kept thinking…really? They all did this?
I don’t know if this book will stick with me quite as much as her others did but I still really enjoyed the reading experience. It just took a little longer to get into (and took me a long time to read compared to her others, which are usually completed in like one sitting) and the reveals felt very unrealistic.
The Unwedding by Ally Condie Genres: Adult, Mystery/Thriller
Published by Grand Central Publishing on June 4, 2024
Format: Audio/Physical (320 pages) • Source: Library, Spotify Audiobooks
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REESE’S BOOK CLUB PICK
“Our June Reese’s Book Club pick is the perfect summer read!!! The Unwedding by Ally Condie opens with a wedding at a gorgeous resort in Big Sur... but everything begins to fall apart when the main character Ellery discovers a dead body the morning of the ceremony.”
– Reese Witherspoon
The White Lotus meets Agatha Christie in this bold novel from a #1 New York Times bestselling author, “a knife’s-edge whodunit that’s as much a thriller as it is an exquisite meditation on grief and loss.” (Nicola Yoon)Ellery Wainwright is alone at the edge of the world.
She and her husband, Luke, were supposed to spend their twentieth wedding anniversary together at the luxurious Resort at Broken Point in Big Sur, California. Where better to celebrate a marriage, a family, and a life together than at one of the most stunning places on earth?
But now she’s traveling solo.
To add insult to injury, there’s a wedding at Broken Point scheduled during her stay. Ellery remembers how it felt to be on the cusp of everything new and wonderful, with a loved and certain future glimmering just ahead. Now, she isn’t certain of anything except for her love for her kids and her growing realization that this place, though beautiful, is unsettling.
When Ellery discovers the body of the groom floating in the pool in the rain, she realizes that she is not the only one whose future is no longer guaranteed. Before the police can reach Broken Point, a mudslide takes out the road to the resort, leaving the guests trapped. When another guest dies, it’s clear something horrible is brewing.Everyone at Broken Point has a secret. And everyone has a shadow. Including Ellery.
I had pretty low expectations for this book when I started it – the Goodreads rating is so low that usually I wouldn’t think of picking it up (I’m too easily influenced by these things). However, I was really excited for it and in the mood to read it! I decided to go against my norm and give it a shot.
Unpopular opinion: I liked this, for the most part! I was honestly kind of confused by the low rating for the first 80% of the book too. The setting was the best part: the main character Ellery is stranded at a fancy resort with her newfound friends, Ravi and Nina, and an entire wedding party. When the groom is found dead in the pool by Ellery and bad weather causes a mudslide, stranding everyone there, tensions begin to rise. I loved the “locked room” setting of the resort and the characters were generally interesting the entire time.
Another member of the wedding party dies next and Ellery tries to figure out what’s happening and who the killer is. She was a little too trusting of some characters early on but I guess she felt alone and needed allies.
The book includes flashbacks to some accident that Ellery was a part of and I kept wondering how that would link up with what was happening in present day. Toward the end of the story, there were a lot of threads that didn’t end up going anywhere or being that important. It was good, to me, that the characters had some backstories, but it just added more elements to the plot that either didn’t pay off or didn’t make sense.
When the big reveal begins happening, there was a TON of telling not showing. I won’t spoil exactly what happens but imagine all of the characters sitting around a room and discussing how they figured it out, rather than the reader finding out in real time. Again, tons of connections and plot points didn’t really pay off either.
This wasn’t that bad of a mystery and I honestly enjoyed it for the most part but the ending just kind of happened. I have to think this is why the rating is so low on Goodreads.
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