The Christmas Guest - Peter Swanson ****

By Brian Clegg

This novella gives us a highly engaging Christmas-set (technically it’s in Advent) mystery. We start in the New York apartment of the female narrator, who, at Christmas time, unearths an old diary from exactly 30 years before, covering the days leading up to a horrible event in a Cotswold manor house. 

The majority of the book consists of these diary entries from student days, which are mostly appropriately fluffy and young adult in feel. But at the heart of it all is something much darker.

It’s hard to say more without giving anything away, but it’s all very neatly done, with two big twists in quick succession about three quarters of the way through. 

The only  criticism I have is that once you’ve hit those twists, the ending is a little bit of a let down, as it feels like there should be a final twist to really finish things off – but it remains a really good, intriguing seasonal read, if you like Christmas with a murderous side.

I don’t honestly know why Christmas and darkness go together so well, whether it’s in the form of ghost stories or murder mysteries – but they do make excellent book-fellows.

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Now Appearing is the blog of science writer Brian Clegg (www.brianclegg.net), author of Inflight Science, Before the Big Bang and The God Effect.