NetGalley Review - Whisper Island

Title And Author: Whisper Island by Carissa Ann Lynch

Publisher: HarperCollins/One More Chapter

Bought, Borrowed or Gifted: eProof gifted by UK publisher in exchange for honest review/reaction while Audiobook’s borrowed from local library via BorrowBox app. 

We all know the plot. I mean, Agatha Christie was the first to do it with And Then There Were None, but we’ve seen this done in murder mystery and thrillers since then. Four US college art students – Riley, Mia, Sammy and Scarlett – decide to go to an island in Alaska to work on their art and their friendship. But when they arrive on Whisper Island, they realise that something is very wrong. The island is nothing like the photos Sammy’s brother sent. Then Sammy’s brother, Rob, and his new girlfriend, Opal, arrive unexpectedly, throwing the group through a loop as Rob is Mia’s ex, and Scarlett and Rob seem to have a sudden connection. Then the murders starts...

So... my thoughts on this book. Well... they aren’t good nor kind. I am actually in two minds over writing this write-up for Whisper Island as it’s might come across salty. Now, before I go any further, I do want to say that, while I do have the eProof from the publisher, I listened to the audiobook via my local library and this does pay a factor in my opinions as, I do think that if I had read it, I might have been a tad kinder as the audiobook narrator was very robotic, flat and had it almost impossible to tell each character apart as all their voices were the same. So, not recommending the audiobook.. Sorry on that front.

But the book itself. It’s... well... if I had to sum this up using a gif, it would be the gif was RuPaul going “Meh”. This was just meh and bland.

Now, I gave this book a lot of leeway. I audiobooked the whole story and I knew, going into this, that it wasn’t going to be a five star read, but I was expecting something fun, edge of your seat gripping, with twists and turns that I wouldn’t see coming. I got none of them.

The story, the writing, the characters, the twists all felt flat and really bland. I didn’t care for any of the characters (who were in their early/mid 20s and yet, would speak like they were much, much older but make dumb decisions of teenagers), and seeing as the first murder didn’t happen till around the 55% mark, that’s plenty of them to make me like them. But nope. I found them bland and interchangeable (even though they all had their own secrets, none of which catch and held my attention) and, even though each chapter was told from one of the main four (with Sammy’s brother and his girlfriend talking one or two chapters), their voices were exactly the same, all irritating and all using the same turn of phrases. If it wasn’t for them saying each other’s characters name EVERY TIME THEY SPOKE, I would have got completely lost.

The killer was an easy guess (there was only one real suspect, in my opinion) and their motives might have been easy to figure for some readers. And it was the last 20% that I began to like the book. Things began to fall into place and one or two (easy to spot) twists and then, of course, we have the showdown. Still not written great, but the showdown held me.

I think I get what the author was trying to do with Whisper Island, but it doesn’t work. It comes across flat, bland and forgettable.