The Dinner Guest by B.P. Walter

The story opens with a murder. Nothing quite like being dropped in at the deep end. The rest of the book looks at the immediate aftermath and the events leading up to the killing. Who was the guest and why was she so unsettling?

Despite the title, which suggests an Agatha Christie type whodunnit, this book is about the interlinking relationships between a group of people over a series of years. Told from the point of view of two characters, one of whom admits the murder of the husband of the other protagonist, the suspicions fall between so many of people at the centre of the story. Not even sure that everyone actually had dinner on that fateful night...

Always guessing what lies behind the motivations for some of the bizarre choices, this is a story of deception, vengeance and keeping up appearances. There is plenty of distasteful snobbery and stereotypical class behaviours that leave us with no one to root for as everyone has an ugly side. Still, the urge to find out what is going on and what has happened in the past that leads to the murder is what drives the story. Easy to read but a little incredulous in places (do the modern entitled class really talk like this?) and the huge information dump monologue towards the end made this a slightly disappointing thriller. 

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Published by HarperCollins UK, One More Chapter on 1 April 2021.
​Advance review copy supplied by the publisher.

Capital Chronicles: London Through Time