A book a day: Nita Prose: The mysterious guest

Original title: The mistery guest
Year of publication: 2023
Translation: Angela Esteller García
Valuation: Alright

50 Phil Ochs fans can´t be wrongThis phrase appeared on the back cover of Phil Ochs’ greatest hits album and was a tribute (sui generis, of course) to Elvis Presley’s album. 50.000.000 Elvis fans can´t be wrong.

Strange start to a review, isn’t it? Not so much, folks, because one can’t help but feel like an “oddball” when one sees on the The mysterious guest that the novel has won the Goodreads Award for best mystery book and has had more than 2,000,000 readers around the world (I add that it has 104,314 “ratings” and 11,802 “reviews” on Goodreads). And I’m in my bubble of weird Yugoslavians and modern Argentines! “get down into the mud”take off your glasses and mingle with the reading rabble to see if it’s really that big of a deal or not.

In terms of plot, the premise of the book is the death, moments before making an important announcement at the Regency Grand Hotel, of a famous mystery novelist. Coincidentally, Molly Gray, a waitress, amateur detective and narrator of the story, works there. She will show off a perspicacity that will make Jessica Fletcher or Miss Marple laugh (the British reference is not trivial) to solve the problem. To do so, the author uses two time periods that allow the introduction of thematic variables that are apparently unrelated to the main plot.

The standard-bearer of contemporary cozy crime (you know, murders without guts and with a slight humorous touch), Nita Prose knows how to mix the ingredients to make her recipe an instant best-seller: a simple and direct style, a fast pace, generally acceptable dialogues and characters, sustained tension and the introduction of more or less current themes that accompany the main plot are the pillars on which a novel is based that is very much for all audiences (almost from 0 to 99 years old, wow) that, despite obvious weaknesses, holds up with dignity in literary terms.

Among these weaknesses we must mention a certain overuse of adjectives in the most descriptive parts, some overly stereotypical characters or the excessively cloying mentions of the narrator’s relationship with her grandmother or with her partner.

Therefore, The mysterious guest It is a novel that, despite the above, fulfills what it promises: it entertains, it hooks you and it makes for a very pleasant afternoon. Whether it is sufficient or not, that is a matter of taste and readers.