The Other Guest by Heidi Perks

Today it’s over to Mandie who is sharing her thoughts on The Other Guest by Heidi Perks. Here’s what the book is all about:

About the Book

She thinks she knows the truth. But what if she’s wrong?

Laila and her husband arrive for a week’s holiday in Greece in desperate need of a reset.

As Laila sits by the pool she finds herself inexplicably drawn to the other family staying in their resort.

Em has no idea who Laila is, or that she has been watching her and her teenage sons and husband so intently.

Five days later their worlds will be blown apart by a horrifying event.

Laila thinks she knows the truth of what happened. But in telling Em what she’s seen, she stands to lose everything she holds dear.

And what if she’s got it wrong?

Mandie’s Thoughts

Laila and her husband James are on holiday in Greece in the hope to recapture the early years of their marriage which has been under strain after many years of failed IVF treatment. When the body of one of the guests is found in the resort pool Laila is convinced she knows who is responsible but does she really know what happened or is she making assumptions?

Laila is definitely a people watcher to the point she spends more time trying to work out the dynamics of some of the other guests than she does on her own husband who also seems very preoccupied during the stay. It is the people watching aspect of her personality that I can relate to as I always find myself doing the exact same thing if I have too much time on my hands but that is where the similarity ends as I am not one for lounging by a pool all day and would much rather explore the places I visit. I can kind of understand her resentment of her husband who seems intent on doing things that exclude her and bring up events from his own past that do more harm than good and I often felt like I would dearly love to bang their heads together. With the secrets that you sensed they were both hiding I did wonder if the holiday would produce the results they had hoped for. 

Laila and James were not the only ones with secrets and as we learned more about the family of the murdered boy you could see that there was a lot of tension between the two sons and even Laila suspected him of being up to no good. 

I liked the way that the chapters were broken up between the aftermath of the body being found, the days that ran up to it and also going between Laila and Em (the mother of the victim). This gave me different perspectives and also more than one possible conclusion as to what actually happened. Although like the police you want to know what happened, the investigation took more of a back seat to this story as I felt it was more about the characters rather than what happened. The slower pace gives the reader the chance to discover that what we present on the surface may not be the whole story and that every action no matter how small can sometimes have devastating consequences.

About the Author

Heidi Perks is the Sunday Times bestselling author of Now You See Her, which was a Richard and Judy Book Club pick, Come Back for Me, Three Perfect Liars and The Whispers. The Other Guest is her fifth novel. Heidi is a voracious reader of crime and thrillers and is fascinated by the darker side of our closest relationships. Heidi lives in Bournemouth with her husband and two children.