I picked up this one off of a library display for the sake of Dekalb's centennial challenge. Then I had to rush through it because someone else requested it. While I do like mysteries, I'm always a little hesitant to pick up a new one. A poorly crafted mystery is a true disappointment.
However, I needed a book from a library display for the challenge and You Are Fatally Invited seemed the most promising of the books on display. I later realized that it would have also satisfied two other categories as a debut book and one that features several unreliable narrators.
You Are Fatally Invited is borrowing heavily from a couple of Agatha Christie's novels. It features a group of mystery/thriller authors who are all invited out to an island retreat to theoretically work on their novels. However people start dying at a quick rate and each of the attendees is hiding something.
If that sounds like the plot to And Then There Were None, that's because it essentially is. The set up is virtually the same. The narrative bops around to each of the guests' points of view and its clear that they aren't just lying to each other; in some cases they are lying to themselves. One of the main points of view, Mila, is particularly annoying in that she keeps addressing her monologue to a mysterious "you." Second person narrative is tough to pull off and Pliego wasn't entirely successful. That being said, the character intrigue was well plotted and well designed. Pliego dropped loads of pop culture references which were fun to decode.
Overall, this was a good worthwhile read. It's particularly impressive for a debut novel.
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