The Murder Game, and why does everyone seem so guilty?

You know that one friend who is a bit too much into fancy dress and themed parties? Lucas Jarrett is that guy, and he sure as hell takes the murder mystery game to another level - a hostage/blackmail/murder investigation level. The Murder Game offers an interesting twist to the closed house murder mystery by taking us through a couple of timelines and multiple points of view before we uncover the culprit.

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Now, let's deal with the trigger warnings first. This book contains graphic references to past kidnapping and multiple rapes, as well as a kidnapping and fear of rape within the current narrative. If this is a topic which you find upsetting, the book is not for you, as the past trauma is a focal plot point around which the mystery revolves.

There's also a lot of gaslighting being piled on one of the main character. It's thinly veiled as this group of friends having a toxic bond, but they're all hella messed up and definitely emotionally bullying her poor Gemma. She must really love her partner to stick around for all this BS - I'd have been out of that dumpster fire reunion before the beer cooled.

Oh, and speaking of Gemma, in the final act of the story, she becomes the embodiment of 'promising young man' apologists by deciding not to expose Lucas for a series of fucked up, decidedly illegal things he's done, purely because it would ruin his life. Duh! That's the point of criminal justice.

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Okay, now for the bits I actually did like! The way the narrative unfolds is incredibly engaging - Abbott manages to weave multiple viewpoints together in such a tantalising way that each chapter leaves you at the edge of your seat, craving to know more! And while I guessed pretty early on what happened to Alex, at least in broad terms, I struggled to puzzled out how the rest of the mystery gets resolved.

All of the character are extremely suspicious, save for the two heroines - poor gaslit Gemma and detective King who can't catch a break. I love to see a tale packed full of dysfunctional characters (check out my reviews for Vicious and Vengeful); it makes for such a colourful story, and takes us for a ride along some pretty wild psyches.

Usually, whenever someone or other appears really guilty in a muder mystery, it turns out to be a red herring. Not where Abbott is concerned though - her characters are all hiding dirty secrets that come spilling until they get to the murder - kind of like the world's least fun game of bingo!

As for the resolution itself, I am on the fence. On one hand, it felt a bit anticlimactic; I was fully expecting an elaborate scheme which tied the whole friend group in a complicated crime knott. Alas, we got one main baddie, and a bunch of white, middle-aged men in positionsnof privileges who got away with 'less serious' crimes (and that's big air quotes!).

On the other hand, the reveal(s) struck a good balance between surprising and logical. There were breadcrumbs I picked up on as the narrative unfolded, and even though I failed to predict how they link together, I noted that they're important tidbits of information. Plus, the final beat of the story sees two of the characters bringing themselves to justice, and I mean, fair play!

Overall, The Murder Game was an entertaining mystery novel with enough suspense to sufficiently spook me without actually putting me off reading further. The audio book is also helped by talented narrator Olivia Vinall, whose accent work was extremely enjoyable.

4/5 stars