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The Guest List by Lucy Foley

Thriller

The Guest List

BOTY FINALIST

Each year thousands of members vote for our Book of the Year award—congrats to The Guest List!

Early Release

This is an early release that's only available to our members—the rest of the world has to wait to read it.

by Lucy Foley

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Quick take

Plot twist: This high-profile wedding starts with a murder. You'll be left to guess whodunit alongside its guests.

Good to know

  • Illustrated icon, Family_Drama

    Family drama

  • Illustrated icon, Action_packed

    Action-packed

  • Illustrated icon, Creepy

    Creepy

  • Illustrated icon, Whodunit

    Whodunit

Synopsis

On an island off the coast of Ireland, guests gather to celebrate two people joining their lives together as one. The groom: handsome and charming, a rising television star. The bride: smart and ambitious, a magazine publisher. It’s a wedding for a magazine, or for a celebrity: the designer dress, the remote location, the luxe party favors, the boutique whiskey. The cell phone service may be spotty and the waves may be rough, but every detail has been expertly planned and will be expertly executed.

But perfection is for plans, and people are all too human. As the champagne is popped and the festivities begin, resentments and petty jealousies begin to mingle with the reminiscences and well wishes. The groomsmen begin the drinking game from their school days. The bridesmaid not-so-accidentally ruins her dress. The bride’s oldest (male) friend gives an uncomfortably caring toast.

And then someone turns up dead. Who didn’t wish the happy couple well? And perhaps more important, why?

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Get an early look from the first pages of The Guest List.

The Guest List

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The Wedding Night

The lights go out.

In an instant, everything is in darkness. The band stop their playing. Inside the tent the wedding guests squeal and clutch at one another. The light from the candles on the tables only adds to the confusion, sends shadows racing up the canvas walls. It’s impossible to see where anyone is or hear what anyone is saying: above the guests’ voices the wind rises in a frenzy.

Outside a storm is raging. It shrieks around them, it batters the tent. At each assault the whole structure seems to flex and shudder with a loud groaning of metal; the guests cower in alarm. The doors have come free from their ties and flap at the entrance. The flames of the paraffin torches that illuminate the doorway snicker.

It feels personal, this storm. It feels as though it has saved all its fury for them.

This isn’t the first time the electric has shorted. But last time the lights snapped back on again within minutes. The guests returned to their dancing, their drinking, their pill-popping, their screwing, their eating, their laughing . . . and forgot it ever happened.

How long has it been now? In the dark it’s difficult to tell. A few minutes? Fifteen? Twenty?

They’re beginning to feel afraid. This darkness feels somehow ominous, intent. As though anything could be happening beneath its cover.

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Why I love it

The Guest List is the perfect book to lose yourself in for a few hours—it’s a constant page turner! A thrilling web of mystery that reminded me of Agatha Christie, reading this book felt like playing a game of ‘Clue.’ You know that feeling … when new information blows your assumptions out of the water just as you’re about to shout, “it was Colonel Mustard in the library!”

When the story opens, we find ourselves on a creepy island off the coast of Ireland, in the throes of a wedding celebration. The bride and groom are gorgeous, charming, and mildly famous, and every last detail—from the floral arrangements to the menu to the guest list itself—is perfect. Or is it? Quickly, things spin out of hand. The groom’s best friends are rowdy. The bride’s family possesses secrets galore. And then, a body is found.

By the time I reached the thrilling final pages, I felt like I myself was a guest on that island—and I was dying to get off! If you’re looking for a book to take you on an exquisite ride, look no further. Just hunker down, put your phone on silent, pop a bottle of wine, and start The Guest List.

Member ratings (72,826)

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Thriller
View all
The Boyfriend
The Last One at the Wedding
Sleep Tight
First Lie Wins
House of Glass
Middle of the Night
Listen for the Lie
A Talent for Murder
Beautiful Ugly
Someone in the Attic
One Perfect Couple
Like Mother, Like Daughter
Kill for Me, Kill for You
Bad Tourists
Murder Road
Daughter of Mine
The Fury
The Other Mothers
When I’m Dead
The Soulmate
What Lies in the Woods
She Started It
The Only One Left
Dark Corners
Blacktop Wasteland
All the Dangerous Things
The Only Survivors
The Broken Girls
The Family Game
The Push
We Were Never Here
Things We Do in the Dark
The Golden Couple
The Stranger Upstairs
Gone Tonight
Too Good to Be True
The Last Word
You Are Not Alone
Rock Paper Scissors
Not a Happy Family
A Flicker in the Dark
Reckless Girls
The House Across the Lake
The Last Thing He Told Me
The Maidens
Everything We Didn't Say
The Paris Apartment
You're Invited
The Last Party
Dark Places
Pieces of Her
The Wife Between Us
Sharp Objects
None of This Is True
The Silent Patient
The Other Woman
Necessary People
The Family Upstairs
The Night Swim
Girl A
The Hunting Wives
Just Another Missing Person
First Born
The Lies I Tell
Breathless