The Guest is a thriller novel which keeps you guessing all the way through and keeps you on your toes. It is an unpredictable story and the characters are all very developed.

thank you to netgalley and publisher for giving me this ARC for honest review and opinion.
the book is a domestic thriller where a couple, Ellie and Seth, have Set cousin friend move into the house. he has lost his job but doesn't tell anyone that he has not been going to work. A girl at their children's school is murdered, who was bullying one of their children. it was an ok book, twists and turns but i feel like i have read something very similar to this book already.

The Guest by Cathryn Grant

Life has been good to Ellie – she owns a successful art gallery, is deeply in love with her husband, Seth, and has two beautiful children, Brandon and Simone.
But not everything is perfect…
Lately, Seth seems to have something on his mind and has become cold and distant. And things don’t improve when he invites the mysterious stranger Ace to stay in their home.
Ace is charming, but Ellie can’t help feeling there’s more to him than meets the eye, that he has some kind of agenda. She’s also aware that she is dangerously attracted to him.
Then a girl at Brandon’s school is murdered, and Ellie is beyond devastated when the police tell her they think her son might be involved...

I struggled with this book, I found it slow and in some parts boring. There was way too much going on, too many twists taking away from the overall plot. I couldn’t connect with the characters. It felt flat when I was reading. Took me a few days to finish.
Unfortunately only 2 stars from me.

I really enjoyed this book up until about 3/4 of the way through. I enjoyed the character development, and some parts of the story line kept me guessing. I was intrigued to see whether Brandon was the wayward teen the author was leading us to believe, or whether he was an innocent party in amongst this plot. Unfortunately, towards the end the plot lost momentum and fell completely flat. The ending required too much suspension of disbelief and was actually quite laughable. I felt like the 3/4 build-up was interesting, built great suspense, and was a really enjoyable read... and then the ending happened.

An intriguing thriller.

The premise of this is thought-provoking and will leave you wondering what is right and wrong.

I highly recommend this one for anyone interested in high octane thrillers.

3 Stars.

This book was good, but I'm struggling to put my finger on what was missing.

It starts out with Ellie, who is married to Seth, and they have two children. Brandon and Simone. Seth invites his cousin's friend, Ace to come and live with them without Ellie's permission. Right before Ace's arrival, a girl in Brandon's school was murdered and the police want to speak with him because she was bullying him. While all of this is going on Ellie finds out that Seth lost his job, over 6 weeks ago, and was pretending to still go to work.

The story follows the plot of most domestic thrillers. Husband does inexplicable things. He stops talking to his wife. Enter hot stranger. I won't give anything further away, but I feel like this has been done before. There were some nice twists and turns, but ultimately, I feel like it was disjointed and a bit unbelievable.

A special thank you to NetGalley, Inkubator, and Cathryn Grant for providing me with an ARC..

Ellie doesn’t think she can trust Ace or her husband Seth to tell her the truth and she’s right! Between the murder of her son’s classmate, the unwanted guest Ace and her husband keeping secrets, Ellie has no way to figure out what’s best for her family and as a reader you’re with her all the way and then you find out!!! I won’t spoil it but you will not see what’s coming until the books final chapters and then hold on to have what you thought was going on, turned around!!

Highly recommend this book!! As a first time Cathryn Grant reader I’m now downloading her others as I type this!!!

This one is COMPLETELY unpredictable! It was full of cliff-hangers and had me hanging on every. last. word. Absolutely will be recommending. You can tell that Cathryn Grant has written so many stories- she knows what she's doing! Thank you to NetGalley for a free copy in exchange for an honest review.

We've all heard that well known saying to never judge a book by it's cover that I try to stick to as much as possible, but I'd be lying if I tried to convince you that covers never help with the initial decision to start or toss a book. That's what caught my attention with The Guest at first. It pains me to say that the cover was the best bit.

There's no doubt that the premise is promising. The Guest focuses on Ellie, a successful art gallery owner who takes pride in her perfect family of husband Seth and two children, Brandon and Simone. Things start to get shaken up with Seth invites an almost stranger to stay with them for the foreseeable future. Ace is charming, which scares Ellie. How can she be so attracted to a man she knows nothing about? Then a girl at Brandon's school is murdered. With her son quickly becoming a suspect, Ellie is devastated but is certain Ace is connected to the crime. While digging for the truth, terrible secrets are uncovered that will change her life forever.

Although full of unexpected twists and turns, there was something about this that just fell flat for me. The action scenes are well written, however the lead up felt more like filler chapters. There were paragraphs of descriptions that I felt weren't exactly necessary, such as what meal the family were eating every day and what wine was paired with it. If you're looking for a cookbook, this one's for you. Spoiler alert: there was near enough an entire chapter that focussed on prepping meatballs for dinner. So if you're searching for a psychological thriller that will keep you on your toes, I'd suggest looking elsewhere.

It could be a personal thing but I struggle to enjoy books where I can't connect with any characters or find any sense of realism within the fictional world. Don't get me wrong, there were certain situations where I thought, "Oh, that could actually happen." For instance, Brandon's obsession with a girl from school and the worry that almost overwhelms Ellie when Brandon becomes a potential suspect in the murder of the girl on their street. Despite these events, the character development was weak, which struggled to keep me engaged.

The lack of character development caused the big twist at the end to flop. It wasn't expected, I'll give Grant that, and the writing kept me interested and eagerly turning the pages to read what was going to happen next. However, twists of this kind usually have small, "blink and you'll miss it" details cleverly placed throughout the book, but because there was nothing of the sort, it almost felt as though Grant wanted it to be that much of a surprise that it left me feeling more confused than anything else.

I felt a bit disappointment by this book. There were lots of twists and turns, the plot was unbelievable over all iti fell flat for me.

This was a great novel that I had a wonderful time reading. The characters were well depicted and the storyline flowed seamlessly.

If the purpose of the book is to dislike EVERY character with the exception of the six-year-old, then mission accomplished. The Guest captures the death of a young teenage girl and chronicles the story of one of her neighboring families. I don't want to speak too much on the plot, as I don't want to spoil it. I will, however, say this. I didn't dislike the story, but I'm not a fan. It was good, but it doesn't great. The redemption comes in the end. This twist saved my opinion of the book.

Thank you Netgalley for giving me an advanced copy of the book for my honest feedback and opinion.

A pretty standard psychological thriller. Interesting enough to keep my interest. The number of “twists” was a little excessive, making it difficult for the entire plot to remain believable.

Ellie has it all: a loving Husband, Seth, and two adoring children, Brandon and Simone, as well as a successful career as a gallery owner.

But everything is not as it seems in Ellie’s apparent perfect life after Seth becomes cold and distant. Ellie thinks maybe she’s being paranoid when he invites a stranger, Ace, to stay with them.

Make yourself at home may be the worst decision she has ever made.

Ellie doesn’t fully trust Ace, and she is also dangerously attracted to him. When her son Brandon is accused of the murder of a girl in his school, she knows Ace must have something to do with it.

But maybe she is about to discover she is wrong.

This book is told from Ellie’s point of view, which was such a clever way for the author to open the door to her life and conflicting feelings. It was as if I was in her head the entire time!

A story full of suspense, where you keep wondering what else could happen to this poor lady? The various twists and scary moments come together at the end and leave you satisfied.

A book that starts off well and ends well, The Guest by Cathryn Grant is a sublime example of suburban noir.

Disclosure: I would like to thank NetGalley and Inkubator Books for an ARC of The Guest by Cathryn Grant. This is my honest review.

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The Guest or the book that keeps you guessing... is a twisty suspense filled psychological thriller that keeps you trying to figure out the baddie until the last second. An edge of the seat, compelling page turner.

The action and suspense parts of this book were very well-written. I will admit, though, that the other parts seemed disjointed and not completely thought out. The characters didn't seem very developed either. I almost didn't finish this book multiple times but did end up pushing through. I am glad I finished because the ending was great writing!

The Guest by Cathryn Grant kept me up all night. Not just to read it, but it is spine-tingling scary. This book kept me racing through the pages to find out what was going to go wrong next. First, the murder of a teenage neighbor, a stalker and a break in. What else could happen to this woman? You have to find out by reading it. I promise you will not be regretting this decision.

Thanks to NetGalley and to the publisher for my ARC which I received in exchange for my honest review. The Guest is the first book I have read by author Cathryn Grant.. I am a huge fan of psychological thrillers so I was very excited to be approved for this title. Unfortunately, The Guest did not live up to my expectations.

The book has a promising premise. Successful art gallery owner Ellie, is surprised when her husband Seth invites a stranger home for dinner. While suspicious of the newcomer, Ellie finds herself attracted to the mysterious Ace. Ace's presence in the home only amplifies the problems in Ellie's marriage and she is devastated to learn that her husband has been keeping secrets from her. Even more distressing is the murder of a local girl which brings the police to Ellie's door to question her teenage son, Brandon.

Seth's duplicity soon becomes apparent and Ellie finds it impossible to reconnect with a husband who is unemployed, moody and virtually estranged from his stepson. Meanwhile, Ace ingratiates himself with Brandon and helps him navigate the do's and don't's of police interrogations. Although Ellie can't help but wonder why Ace knows so much about criminal investigations, this does nothing to cool her ardor for him.

I found the first 70% of the book to be tedious and slow. The author describes food and meal preparation in such detail that at times I felt as though I were reading a cookbook instead of a thriller. Seriously, if you are interested in what a character had for breakfast, lunch and dinner and what wine they paired with their meals, then this is the book for you!

Thankfully, the second half of the book is better than the first. The story has a lot of twists and turns and there are some truly pulse pounding moments towards the end. While I did enjoy the shocking conclusion, it is a bit of a boring journey to get there.

This is a tricky book to review without hinting at a spoiler. If I were evaluating it for being well written, I would give a strong 5 stars. Five stars as well for keeping me trying to figure out who the true bad guy or culprit is here. But the clues were there and I did have a pretty good sense of where the plot was heading.

You've got the murder of a young neighborhood girl. And you have Ellie, her husband Seth, son Brandon and daughter Simone. Ellie is happy with her very successful art gallery. And pleased that she is able to attribute her own very hard work and talents to that success. But knowing her own family close up as she does, it is apparent that the cracks in its foundation are widening.

The entire story is told from Ellie's point of view and she is quite good at getting you to empathize with her. There is no doubt that she is a loving, attentive mother and wife. But this is where I think her character structure begins to lose consistency.. For such a strong woman who has built a business so wealth-producing that she married husband Seth with a pre-nup, she seems awfully wimpy at getting her husband to kick this unwanted stranger out of her house.

Given the stranger is exceedingly handsome, charming, gentlemanly, kind, endearing himself to the kids and very helpful around the house, Ellie's gut is still telling her not to trust this stranger. Or her own feelings of attraction towards him. So I accept that she has strong mixed feelings. But the behavior she accepts from her own husband Seth is where I had to suspend my belief. Most strong, successful women would not put up with the outrageous behavior that Seth seemed string out for far too long. And a strong woman would have checked out her husband's story about losing his job, fooling around about getting another one, uncharacteristically spending week-ends away from home and on the golf course. And she would have googled the mysterious houseguest, Ace, right away instead of waiting so long. She would have asked him to explain his circumstances much earlier on if she were going to allow him to live in her house, given very strong protective motherly instincts.

But by the end of the story you learn that she is not at all a weak woman to be messed with and apparently never was. For that reason, I believe the author significantly misrepresented her so that she could set us readers up for a "shock" ending. So the storyline becomes more than a little disingenuous.

My honest opinion. And I am thankful to the publisher for allowing me to read and review "The Guest". Having said all of that, I do think that it is better written with a smooth, straight forward prose than many I have been reading lately. So must conclude that most of the book has great potential, maybe just some important inconsistencies to iron out, if possible.

I read this book in a day Wow what a read. You get to feel attached to Ellie and Seth and their children Brandon and Simone. When Ace comes to stay - a man Ellie doesn't know even though he is a friend of Seth's family, she is immediately attracted to.him, but she doesn't know him and his past. When a girl is found dead who Brandon goes to school with alarm bells start to ring who is Ace and where did he come from? Is Brandon capable of murder as revenge for being bullied, or did someone else kill her?

Will definitely be looking for more novels from Cathryn Grant thank you for letting me read this book in exchange for an honest review.