The Guests

In the latest thriller from Hunt (Lovely Girls), the wealthy Davies family and a few of their friends are waiting out a category 5 hurricane in their mansion on the water. When they take in some stranded boaters, a violent evening to unfolds. The story is fast-paced, with each chapter told from the perspective of a different character. Hunt uses flashbacks judiciously to guide the mystery and explain the motivations for the crime, initially laid out as the theft of a Cézanne sketch. There is suspense caused not only by the invaders in the home but also by the danger of the approaching storm. The crime hinges on multiple moving pieces, and for readers it is better not to think about how it all could have been set up, instead enjoying the suspense over who will survive the night. The novel’s main character, whose perspective is shared the most, is unfortunately boring, and an epilogue detailing events from one year later feels unnecessary.