Sneha Jaiswal (Twitter | Instagram)
This murder mystery was a solid 4-star read until the climactic chapters rolled in, revealing the killer’s identity! It was like enjoying a fantastic three-course meal, only to be hit with a stale, sour dessert at the end. Also, for those who don’t like the narrator breaking the fourth wall and addressing the reader (like Deadpool or Fleabag), this could be annoying. I’m ambivalent about this literary device; sometimes I enjoy it (in this case, I did), in other cases—not so much.
The Cunningham family is quite colorful, and some members are more evidently murderers than others. Take protagonist Ernest’s elder brother Michael, for instance, who goes to jail for murdering a man. In fact, it’s his release date that prompts the family reunion at the snowy hotel. Audrey, their mother, is the family matriarch. She is upset with Ernest for testifying against Michael and is married to their shrewd stepdad, lawyer Marcelo. Since Michael’s history of murder is clearly established in the first chapter of the novel, he becomes one of the strongest suspects.
Benjamin Stevenson starts off the novel by listing Ronald Knox’s 10 Commandments of Detective Fiction, where rule number is pretty clear – The criminal must be someone mentioned in the early part of the story, but must not be anyone whose thoughts the reader has been allowed to follow. Ernest, the narrator promises to stick to Knox’s rules and swears he isn’t going to be the murderer, since we’re allowed to follow his thoughts. Ernest like his name, does try to not mislead us, and Benjamin’s easy, mildly humorous writing style makes this a novel a largely breezy read. That is, until we finally know who the killer is!
The revelation was unexpected, it definitely catches the reader (or at least me) off-guard, but it doesn’t hit the way a fantastic murder mystery would. Let’s call the killer Nat – short for either Natalie or Nathaniel, there are no characters by those names, it’s just to keep things gender neutral and spoiler-free. Now, like all good murder mysteries, author Benjamin Stevenson makes the reader suspicious of almost everybody in “Everyone In My Family Has Killed Someone”, including Nat. But nobody’s motive is crystal clear until the very end, so when the big reveal about the murderer happens, despite a lot of new information and story twists, Nat’s motivation doesn’t feel satisfactory. It doesn’t give you the ‘aha!’ kind of satisfaction.
But of-course, some readers might not mind the ending and this could still end up being a 4 or even a 5 star read for you! One of the best bits about reading “Everyone in my Family Has Killed Someone” was how easily I could visualize the stories and characters, in-fact, I kept thinking of how actor Timothy Simons (Veep/Nobody Wants This) would be perfect to play Michael, Ernest’s brother, if this novel gets a live-action adaptation.
My rating? 3 on 5 stars.
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