The Search Party

November 6, 2023
The appealing latest from Richell (The River Home) injects new life into a familiar narrative scaffolding. In a prologue, a girl jumps off the edge of a cliff after an unidentified man urges her to do so. The action then shifts to an interview between the Cornish police and Dominic Davies, a Simon Cowell–like judge on the fictional reality TV show Star Search, about an unspecified tragedy. Davies says that he and his family were invited to visit his university friend, Max Kingsley, at a new glamping resort he’d set up with his wife, Annie, in rural England. After Davies concedes that he thinks everyone at that gathering did things they regret, Richell rewinds the narrative back two days to flesh out what led to the police interrogation, alternating perspectives and highlighting what each character eventually shares with Cornish authorities. She cleverly doles out key details in increments: Annie asks for news from the local hospital during her interrogation; several characters refer to the findings of a search party before Richell reveals what they are. While the book’s Rashomon structure is hardly original, Richell utilizes it well, providing her large cast with distinct voices and insights. It’s a diverting puzzle.

November 15, 2023
An idyllic glamping weekend in Cornwall turns nightmarish in Richell's tense thriller. It's the May Day holiday weekend. Max and Annie Kingsley have invited old college friends Dominic Davies, Kira de Silva, Jim Miller, and Suze Miller, along with their families, down to the Cornish coast for the soft launch of their new Wildernest glamping business. Not long before, much to the surprise of the old gang, the couple abandoned their London careers as successful architects in search of a quieter life with Kip, their adopted 12-year-old son. The six friends had last seen each other at Kira's 40th birthday party more than a year earlier, and unresolved tensions raised by Kira's angry meltdown that night simmer beneath the surface of a cheery reunion. But after Dominic violently breaks up an altercation between Kip and Phoebe, his 6-year-old daughter, over a purloined marshmallow, the mood among the adults darkens along with the weather. Ominous clouds soon break into a ferocious storm that cuts the group off from outside help just as secrets are revealed and one of the party's members disappears. While this scenario has been used many times before (see Sean Dolittle's Device Free Weekend, 2023), Richell's fifth novel cleverly plants numerous red herrings and skillfully juggles the multiple points of view and timelines to build white-knuckled suspense and keep readers guessing. The wild Cornish landscape adds to the eerie mood. With the character of Kip, the author could easily have relied on the troubled-adoptee-who-wants-to-destroy-his-family trope but instead, she draws a sensitive portrait of an abused, misunderstood child and the adoptive parents who struggle to love him. An engrossing, twisty read.

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December 1, 2023
Your oldest friends are your best friends--or are they? When Max and Annie leave their successful London lives to establish Wildernest, a luxury "glamping" getaway on a remote stretch of Cornwall's coast, they invite three of their friends from university days for a soft opening. They arrive, along with spouses, significant others, children, and plenty of baggage, much of it psychological. Before long, old resentments and secrets surface, violent arguments erupt, and in the chaos, one of the children goes missing. The search becomes perilous when an unexpected storm blows through, cutting off power, cell service, and the roads, along with any hope of rescue from professionals. Richell (The River Home, 2020) surprises readers at every turn with a fast-paced, tightly constructed thriller that mines all the drama inherent in lifelong, complicated relationships. Readers who devour psychological suspense from authors like Lucy Foley and Ruth Ware will be eager to add this one to their reading lists.

COPYRIGHT(2023) Booklist, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.