Jessica Woodbury's Reviews > The Guests

3.5 stars. I was bowled over by Ravatn's novel The Seven Doors, a kind of modern Greek tragedy. The Guests has some things in common, though it's smaller, slower, and subtler. I think it may have worked better as a novella or even a short story with a more limited focus, but this is mostly because I think readers will approach this expecting it to be a crime novel when it is only sort of suspenseful.

The comparisons to Highsmith are still pretty good. This is a book where almost the entire plot hinges around two people who casually embark on a frivolous lie, unprepared for the consequences of it and the rest of the book is almost entirely watching conversations play out. But the stakes never reach Highsmith levels, it's always a low stakes situation even at its most intense. And there's nothing wrong with that! But I think the reader tends to expect something bigger to come in, which is not entirely something Ravatn is encouraging, but when you say a novel is one of "dark psychological suspense" you're certainly giving the reader that impression. I just think it's more enjoyable if you know that this isn't like The Seven Doors or that last domestic thriller you read.

All that said, I liked what Ravatn is doing though the pacing never fully worked for me. The beginning drags, and I don't think we get enough of an investment in Karin for the payoff to really work. But I love the central idea, that casually pretending to be someone you're not can cause you to reevaluate the person you really are. And I really enjoyed the way we follow Karin's thoughts, the way she can be so callous and harsh towards a woman she admires and desperately wants to be friends with simply because of the mask she's put on. It is a really interesting concept, I'm just not sure the structure and pacing of this novel are exactly right for it.