Title: Happy New Year
Author: Malin Stehn
Publisher: Penguin
Synopsis:
IT SHOULD HAVE BEEN THE PARTY OF THE SEASON
BUT SHE NEVER CAME HOMEIt’s New Year’s Eve. The best night of the year.
As old friends the Wiksells and the Anderssons raise their glasses, their teenage children host their own party across town, finally free to let loose.
But the next morning, seventeen-year-old Jennifer Wiksell is missing.
The hours tick by. The police get involved. And no one knows who to trust.
These two families have a lot to hide.
Could the answer to Jennifer’s disappearance lie close to home?
My review:
A New Year’s Eve party. Some questionable parents (and opinions!). Another – unsupervised – New Year’s Eve party with a group of teenagers…
…you know things are going to go downhill, and fast!
In Happy New Year, we join a group of friends in Sweden on New Year’s Eve. They have known each other since they were young, and are now parents to various kids – two of which are best friends and have persuaded their parents to let them throw a New Year’s Eve party at one of their houses. So the parents gather for their own celebration elsewhere. But that night, one of the girls – Jennifer – goes missing, and it soon becomes clear that some of the adults have something to hide…
What follows is an entertaining narrative that slowly uncovers what happened in the run up to that night, told from different perspectives. I really like the way that none of the characters seem to be perfect – or even that likeable to be honest – but yet it doesn’t stop you from wanting to know what happened to Jennifer. Everything is not as it seems, and this suspense winds through the book, leaving you questioning everyone!
Happy New Year is an easy read that has enough twists to keep the reader wanting to read more, and an ending I did not see coming.
My rating: 3.75/5
Many thanks to the publisher, Penguin, for providing a copy of this book on which I chose to write an honest review.
Happy New Year is published in the UK on 24 November.