Quickly, The Dinner Guest was dull, cliché, and was quite lame. In short, I did not like it. I will have to put the rest of this in spoiler tags, because I really just want to rant. So don't read if you don't want to be completely spoiled.
Firstly, that synopsis. Someone was trying to figure out how to market this book, and this was it. Except this isn't really the story, and when you get to the end you realize this book has nothing to do with a dinner or a dinner guest, and this woman isn't exactly a ‘perfect stranger’. It was quite disappointing and misleading.
Secondly, the characters. Ughh, they're all so dull. Charlie is this unlikeable posh, wealthy, privileged douche that happens to be weirdly suspicious of Rachel for no reason to begin with, except that maybe because she's poor and not from the upper crust circles? Rachel is such a non-character, and you understand there's something off about her when you read her chapters, but can't figure out how Charlie has picked up on it. Matthew brushes off his husband (Charlie) a lot and never actually listens to his concerns. And Titus is a spoiled brat. None of them are likeable or even relatable.
Thirdly, writing style. Each chapter is either a POV from Charlie or Rachel, more often Charlie than Rachel, but they flit between one year ‘before’ and days ‘after’ the murder. This writing style is really starting to feel overused, and personally I hate this style. In this book, it's the only reason you could call this ‘suspenseful’ because the readers have no idea what's happened, yet all the characters in the ‘After’ chapters do. It's a very lazy way to try and keep someone reading. Especially when characters keep saying things like “Especially after what I've found out, but let's not discuss this now” and as a reader it was annoying, and comes across as bad storytelling. It wasn't a page turner because I was invested in the story, I just wanted to know who killed him and why.
Lastly, the ending. Is so lame. You read this book that is building up this whole thing to do with Rachel. Who is she? Turns out, it's cliché and predictable. And then it comes to the end and the actual murder, and it was SUCH a let-down. Absolute ending spoiler alert: Matthew has been having an affair with a woman the entire time, and Charlie didn't even know Matthew was attracted to women, so it's quite the shock to Charlie. Charlie drops the bomb to the readers that he's actually a psychopath and has thoughts about murdering people and inflicting pain. A lot. Yet not a single time in any of his previous chapters did this come across, not even one irrational thought about seriously hurting someone. So you're just like ‘Huh? Since when?'.
THEN as Charlie so easily slips a knife into Matthew's ribs, Rachel literally walks into their flat at that moment and is just like 'Oh. That's what *I* came here to do. What the fuck. Fine. Let's all pretend I did this, and I'll feel at peace with my depression' (And suddenly turns into a mastermind and continues to blackmail Charlie years after). Ughhh. But honestly, that's not even the most disappointing part. Charlie doesn't even confront Matthew about the affair! He doesn't say a single thing about it. He just picks up the knife, walks over and neatly stabs Matthew with it. No discussion. No argument. No, “I know what you've been doing behind my back" I felt so cheated out of that moment, which would have been satisfying.
I only read this book because we're reading it in my book club and I wanted to be able to be part of the discussion…
The whole thing was frustrating. I hated it.