"The Lodge" by Sue Watson

 

"The Lodge" by Sue Watson is a twisty thriller that revolves around a dysfunctional family and is told from dual perspectives in the first POV by the ex-wife and the new wife of Scott.

Angela, Scott's mother, invited the whole family to a weekend in Cornwall to celebrate her 75th birthday. The family includes Scott, Fiona, the ex-wife who still loves her ex, their two kids Sam and Georgia,  Danni, the new wife with their daughter Olivia,  and Jenna, the hired chef. The get-together doesn't go as planned. There are tensions in the air, and the snow locking them in doesn't help any. The plot thickens when the police arrive, investigating them for a nearby hit-and-run accident. When one of them goes missing after a heated argument, things go from bad to worse. As secrets are revealed, the tension escalates, testing the family's bonds to their limits.

I enjoyed the story and loved the setting. The author hides many things, even from the reader, and this is what makes this book captivating. As the plot unfolds and secrets come to light, the reader is kept on edge together with the protagonists. The dual perspectives enrich the plot and enable the reader to get a personal insight into each character. I enjoyed the interactions between the protagonists - you could cut the tension in the air with a knife - felt for the betrayed wife, and had my own theories about it all.  Some of them even were correct, but I didn't guess the final twists. 

I have to say that I didn't like any of the protagonists and found the moral compass of some of them lacking. I wouldn't want to be friends with any of them. The ending was emotive but lukewarm in a way, and I am not sure how I feel about it. The book explores themes of love, infidelity, family, and how far would one go to protect his loved ones.

The book ends up with a moral question, leaving one in an ambivalent frame of mind. I think some of the choices made were morally wrong and sent the wrong message. One wrong choice led to another, and as the saying goes, "The road to hell is paved with good intentions".

Luckily, this is only a story, or so I hope, and one I enjoyed to boot. I definitely recommend the book and would love to read more books by this author. So, take a deep breath and go on a journey with our protagonists as they face moral dilemmas and hard choices in a plot filled with unpredictable twists and turns.

* Thank you NetGalley and (publisher) for the opportunity to read this arc.  All opinions are my own.

* For more info about the book: "The Lodge" by Sue Watson