The Engagement Party – Book Review

And Then There Were None meets I Know What You Did Last Summer in #1 international bestseller Darby Kane’s latest gripping and twisty thriller set on a private island in Maine where secrets piled upon secrets and lies upon lies are all revealed in one fateful weekend.

Emily Hunt went missing from her affluent liberal arts school on graduation weekend. Her body was found floating in a river, and a quiet loner who most people on campus really didn’t know committed suicide. A tenuous link—one text—bound the two dead students together and was enough for law enforcement to close the case. But they got it wrong and now someone is determined to set it right.

Twelve years later, college friends gather to celebrate an engagement over a long overdue getaway on a swanky private island in Maine—with only one way in and one way out. Sierra Prescott, invited as a guest and unconnected to past events, is the only person who soon senses not all is what it seems.

The tension in the air is ignited when they find a dead man in the trunk of a car with a note: time to tell the truth. And things only get worse. As a torrential storm strands them together, the group’s buried stories begin to surface and secrets are bartered. To survive this deadly party, they’ll need to stop a killer before they become prey.

The Engagement Party follows the story of college friends who got involved with the murder of one of their friends, Emily. Now twelve years later, one of their friends is getting married and was invited for the party at a remote island. But when they reach the island, it seems that someone wants to dig the past and whoever wants to dig the past wants the friends to tell the truth about what happened the night Emily was murdered.

Darby Kanes Pretty Little Wife was great which prompted me to get all her latest books. However, the Engagement Party was a disappointment. The story lacked pacing, all the characters except for one of the main characters Sierra was quiet unlikable and annoying. The story is told in multiple POVs–Sierra, Ruthie, Alex with excerpts from the book that someone is writing about Emily’s murder. There were not many twists and turns, the story wasn’t executed well in my opinion. It’s a lockdown mystery but it could have been better if it was written well.

Sierra and Ruthie are the only ones who were not involved in the murder yet they both somehow become a part of the story. The story kind of dragged on and I almost lost interest in some part of the story.

As a result, this book is only worth 2.5 stars in my opinion.