The Stranger Diaries

This one bridges thriller and mystery with some moving pieces. I read the Harbinder Kaur books out of order and I thought this one was a little creepier/spookier than the second one, so I wouldn't read this one right before bed personally.

2,5 sterretjes
Een atmosferische thriller met een spannende opbouw dat me voortdreef om verder te lezen. Helaas vond ik de ontknoping maar niks en toch wel ontgoochelend.
Het verhaal in het verhaal The Stranger leest inderdaad als een klassiek gothic verhaal, maar ook daar liet het einde een beetje te wensen over. Nogal cliché, wat misschien wel weer de bedoeling was.

This was a great story and I love the “book about a book” premise. The book gives us three somewhat unreliable narrators; not unreliable in the sense that they're untrustworthy but rather that they have their own secrets, biases, and goals that don't always align with what's going on during the investigation. With constantly changing perspectives, I was always reevaluating the characters - whether they could be trusted, whether they were involved in the murder, and just what their intentions were. The plot was complex and layered, with new information being uncovered constantly. Claire's diary entries and snippets of R.M. Holland's story, The Stranger, are sprinkled throughout the book, adding additional layers of interest. I absolutely loved that we got The Stranger in full at the end of the book and enjoyed it in its own right. I'll definitely be picking up more by Griffiths in the future.

(Thank you to NetGalley and Houghton Mifflin Harcourt for an advance copy of the book for review.)