Week Six: Not a Happy Family
Hello! Welcome to week six! I finally read a book from my favorite genre, thriller/mystery. This week, I read Shari Lapena’s newest thriller, Not a Happy Family. I preordered this book on Amazon a while back, just to make sure I’d get it as soon as it came out.
This review is going to be a little shorter than my others Because I do not want to give away too much of the story… there are so many twists and turns in this novel that I audibly gasped while reading!
Before I dive into my review, I would like to do a little background on my favorite author: Shari Lapena.
Author Spotlight
Shari Lapena - Canadian Novelist
Shari Lapena is a Canadian Novelist, who resides in Toronto, with many internationally bestselling novels including:
The Couple Next door (my favorite book ever!!)
The End of Her
A Stranger in the House
An Unwanted Guest
Someone We Know
and more!
Before she began her career as a writer, she practiced law as well as taught English! Her first novel published was called Things go Flying, which was nominated for the Sunburst awards in 2009. Every year since 2016 Shari has released a new novel, all apart of the mystery/thriller genre.
Favorite Quote
Dan hesitates and turns to Catherine. "But - you know what this means." He says. Lisa watches her husband, trying to keep down the bile with a hand pressed against her mouth.
"What?" Catherine says as if she isn't following him.
"We're free. All of us, we're free of him."
Initial Response
I think my initial response to this book is a little biased, being that Shari Lapena is my favorite author and wrote my favorite book. I truly think that her books are unlike any I’ve ever read in the genre. You become so drawn into her stories that it’s almost impossible to take a break from reading. She hooks you in with troubling plot lines that leave you wondering, “what’s next?” at every turn of the page. This story surprised me. I found myself really trying to figure out what was gong to happen before it happened... and ended up being wrong a lot of the time. That's how amazing she was with this plotline!
Writing Style/Plot
With a very similar feel to the movie Knives Out, Not a Happy Family prefaces a greedy family who only cares for money, and does not care how they end up obtaining it.
The Merton family is not your average family. Fred and Sheila Merton are very well off, living in a luxurious mansion in Brecken Hill, New York. Fred having recently selling his robotics company, lives comfortably, sitting on millions of dollars. The couple has three children; Catherine, Daniel and Jenna. Now the family rarely gets together, as the title suggests they are not a happy family... but holidays are the exception. The family is getting together for Easter Sunday dinner, at the Merton Estate. The Merton's have also invited their former nanny, Irena, who now is the housekeeper two days a week. They also invite Fred's sister, Audrey, who no one really likes in the slightest (she doesn't attend due to being sick). The dinner starts off pretty normal with small talk and discussing the wonderful meal their about to have. All is pretty well until Fred drops a bomb on everyone, stating his selling their beloved house, cutting off Jenna's allowance, and not lending a single penny to Dan who is tight on money. The children are all very angry, and before they can even finish their meal, everyone leaves.
Fred and Sheila Merton are found brutally murdered in their family home.
The police are on a mad hunt to put together the pieces of what happened the last night they were seen alive. The Merton kids are holding their breath, hoping that the long awaited money in their parent's wills will soon make it to them, and they'd all get what they wanted.
The family tells the police everything was fine at Easter dinner.... but the police don't buy it.
What happens when money becomes more important than your family?
How do you feel relieved after the death of your own parents?
Who can you trust, if not your own siblings?
What if there are secrets still to uncover?...
Lapena is fantastic at creating monsters out of ordinary people. This story has so many twists and turns, you'll be eager to read it all in one sitting. Though all the characters in this story are average people, she proves than anyone can have a dark side. She creates complex, complicated lives out of these very typical characters.
She writes from a bunch of different character viewpoints, but not from chapter to chapter, the perspectives are intermingled and spread out between paragraphs. You get to see the story pieced together from the different minds of the characters, as well as the detectives. Lapena uses the basic investigatory process to slowly bring together the case, and allows her detectives, Reyes and Barr, to unravel the case right in front of you, but somehow not giving away the killer.
I think one of the best parts of her writing is when she shocks you with such an out of the box thought or comment, that you wouldn't expect to come from the character perspective you're reading. Each character is battling with mistrust and fear of one another, unsure who is telling the truth when it comes to the night of the Merton murder's.
Characters
Don't trust anyone. Every character has their fatal flaw, but who is the most motivated to kill Fred and Sheila Merton?
Sheila and Fred Merton: Fred and Sheila, parents to three children: Catherine, Daniel and Jenna. Millionaires, with a gorgeous mansion in Brecken Hill. They have high expectations for all of their children. Somehow though, they are never good enough in Fred's eyes. He is a malicious, drunk, manipulative man who loves to viciously attack his children with complaints, insults and belittlement. Sheila, on the other hand, is silent. Allowing for the horribleness that her husband is. She doesn't really care about how her husband treats the children, only what people would think if they found out the truth about him. She was very unaffectionate towards the children growing up. Now, after Easter Sunday, they are found maliciously murdered in their glorious estate. The mystery now begins, who did it?
Catherine Merton: She had decided to keep her maiden name, the eldest of the Merton children. Mrs. Perfect, described as the favorite. Catherine always wanted to make her parents proud, she became a doctor just to prove to them how great she could be. She married a near perfect man, Ted, who is also a doctor, so they're pretty well off. Catherine also was not shy to say she wanted her parents estate when the time finally came, all her siblings knew it. But is one giant house motive enough for murder?
Dan Merton: The middle child. Dan was harped on the most in his younger years, and even into adulthood he was seen as a failure in his father's eyes. Relatively unstable, but married a lovely lady named Lisa who's always been by his side. Dan had always hoped his father would want to give him the family business when he retired, sadly Fred had other plans. He sold the company for a small fortune right under Dan's nose. The cops sure seem to think that's motive enough for murder...
Jenna Merton: The youngest of the Merton children: the wild child. With crazy colored hair, dark clothes, and an attitude that essentially screams "I don't give a s***", she has always stood out more than her other siblings. Being supported mostly be her parents money, she's trying to "make it" in New York as an artist. She had a bit of a temper as a child, and that mixed with the constant belittling of her artwork, she could also be a likely suspect for the mysterious murder of her parents...
Irena Dabrowski: Poor Irena. The live in nanny of many many years, and now that the children are all grown, she still works for Fred and Sheila as a housemaid a couple days during the week. She is utterly shocked when she comes over and stumbles upon a horrible sight: a blood bath in the home she worked in for so many years. The police find her story to be slightly, off. Could she potentially be the killer?
Audrey Stancik: Younger sister of Fred Merton, and my least favorite character in the book. She is hoping for a fat cut of money from Fred's will, after discussing with him a week before his death the potential of him gifting her half of the 20 million dollars... now she strongly believes one of the children found out and took him out before he could change the will. How far is she willing to go to prove one of the Merton children did it?
Ellen and Rose Cutter: Close friends of Audrey, Ellen being a single mother of Rose, who is close friends with Catherine. Somewhat side characters with perspectives throughout the story.
Likelihood to Recommend
If you know me at all, I've probably recommended one of Lapena's books for you at least once. Or it's possible I've forced her upon you by gifting you one of her novels for special occasion. What I'm trying to say is, absolutely I'd recommend this to anyone who is interested in a suburban mystery, and someone who would enjoy trying to piece together the crazy mystery of Fred and Sheila's murder. All I ask, is if you do read this, please reach out to me and tell me who you guessed it to be. Were you right? did you follow all the clues as closely as you thought?... (I didn't guess the right killer !).
I will read this.
Sounds like a book you can’t put down. Enticing review, Jess. 👏❤️