Book Review - Peter Swanson's The Christmas Guest
The Christmas Guest by Peter Swanson
Published by: William Morrow and Company
Publication Date: October 17th, 2023
Format: Hardcover, 112 Pages
Rating: ★★★★
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Ashley Smith and Emma Chapman might look alike and matriculate at The Courtauld Institute of Art in London but that is where their similarities begin and end. Ashley is American, parentless, and never says the right thing. Whereas Emma is posh, wears cashmere, and grew up surrounded by her family in a manor house in the Cotswolds. She's perfect and always knows the right thing to say. Like when she heard that Ashley would be spending Christmas alone and invited her to join the family celebrations at Stravewood Hall. That was just the absolutely perfect thing to say and do. And here Ashley thought that Emma didn't like her. Now they will be the best of friends. Ashley is off to Clevemoor for Christmas! It's like something out of a romance novel or a murder mystery, a house that's all stone and stained glass and beams across the ceiling and servants quarters! But the real attraction comes in the form of Emma's brother, Adam. He's like Michelangelo's "David" come alive, but with cigarette breath and a penchant for whiskey. If Ashley's luck holds she might actually be in a romance. Though Ashley can't deny the evidence of her eyes when she goes with the siblings to the local pup, the Sheepfold. There she learns about Joanna Davies, a girl who went missing last summer, who might just have been dating Adam. He was questioned by the police and some still suspect him. But the oddest part is that Joanna and Ashley look alike. Her holiday is veering quickly toward the Gothic, a little bit creepy, and little bit sexy. Though Adam then fucks off back to London so Ashley doesn't know what to make of that. Especially as he left her a lovely Christmas present, a white cashmere scarf to keep her warm. Warm on her walks through the woods where she sees a menacing figure with a big bushy beard. Gothic thriller it is then now that the romantic lead has left. She shouldn't have doubted it when she's the doppelganger of a dead girl. Or when Emma returns to Stravewood Hall after being accosted by the menacing figure of Father Christmas. The same figure Ashley had seen. And that is all Ashley wrote. Because her diary ends prior to her brutal death. A diary that Emma has kept all these years with a newspaper article clipped and saved in the back detailing Ashley's murder. Because Emma "killed "Ashley. Set her up as the perfect victim. But why?
This is a novella in two parts. The first part, Ashley's diary, is perfection. It contains the hopes and desires of a young girl who is lovestruck and experiencing the Christmas of her dreams. Until it devolves into a nightmare. The second part is Emma explaining what actually happened and the guilt that weighs her down as she lives under another name in a country far from her family. Because the truth is, pause for spoiler, her brother, Adam, is a serial killer. And all his victims remind him of his sister. Because obviously he's working up to killing her. Which means way back in the eighties she invited Ashley to Stravewood Hall to be her brother's next victim. Ashley was the sacrificial lamb. Which is interesting when you look back on the events of her time in the Cotswolds. I actually liken it to what happened in season two of The White Lotus. Greg takes Tonya to Italy so that his old acquaintances, the 'Evil Gays,' can kill her. She's given the holiday of anyone's dreams. She is treated like a princess. In other words, she is given the treatment that you would give your dog on it's last day alive. Now I'm not denigrating dogs, I'm denigrating any humans who use the excuse of giving someone a perfect experience as some sort of balancing of the scales prior to murder. You can not balance out the scales here. One really good Christmas is not worth a lifetime of Christmases. Now if the person was actually dying, like said dog, well, then it's a sweet denouement to a life, not the brutal theft of a future. The problem I have with this second half is the ghostly aspect. We went from a top-notch, moody, thriller of a period piece with a lovesick narrator to a pale imitation of A Christmas Carol. Yes, Emma has a few more literal ghosts in her closet, but I feel like she should have had some sort of epiphany earlier. It shouldn't have taken her thirty years to get up the courage to rat out her brother. Because it wasn't just Ashley and Joanna, oh no, he's been killing all along. He's racked up quite the body count and if you were connected to one of the victims, how would you feel knowing that there was this person out there who could have stopped it? Personally Emma being haunted and on the run her entire life doesn't in the least make up for not speaking up. She's been a coward her entire life and, with regard to Ashley, a conspirator. I mean, I'll give the story props for trying something new, and I did enjoy it, it's just that it could have been something more. Something original, not Dickensian part deux.
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