Time for another round of Yvonne’s Shorties! This time around a thriller set in Ghana that didn’t quite hit the mark and a thriller set in Australia that ended up being a new favorite.

Title: The Missing American
(Emma Djan Investigation #1)
Author: Kwei Quartey
Genre: Mystery, Thriller, Crime
First published: January 14th 2020
Publisher: Soho Crime
Finished reading: May 4th 2024
Pages: 433

“That Ghanaian police officers were constantly looking for a handout from the citizenry wasn’t even a secret anymore.”

REVIEW

I love a good dose of armchair travel when I’m reading, so it’s easy to understand why this thriller series set in Ghana caught my attention. I’ve been meaning to read The Missing American for a while, and I even added it to my 2024 priorities list to make sure I did… And when I was craving a crime thriller the other day, I decided to give in and finally travel to Ghana to meet main character Emma. I fully expected to love my time with this story, but unfortunately I ended up with mixed thoughts instead. Don’t get me wrong, I loved both the premise and the Ghanaian setting. The descriptions of the different locations really made the country come alive for me, and it was without doubt one of the highlights of this book for me. It was interesting to learn more about Ghana as well as dive into some of the issues people have to face while living there… The whole situation with the sakawa scams, the priest and corruption in general was fascinating. BUT. And here is where it mainly went wrong for me: there was SO much going on and there were SO many POVs and storylines, and as a result the story felt both overcrowded and the plot lacked cohesion. The plot switches constantly to yet another POV, and there are way too many storylines with some of them appearing completely random. These constant switches ment that I never really got a feel for the many characters in play, and they mostly felt like cardboard copies to me. Emma is supposed to be the star of the show as the series is named after her, but I felt like we hardly spent time with her and I never got to know her as a result. The little I did see was promising, but her character seemed completely buried under all the other storylines/POVs. I also struggled with the writing and pace, which sometimes felt off for me. That said, the premise was intriguing, as was the murder investigation itself and how everything was woven together in the end. It just took a LONG time and lots of sidetracks to finally get to that point, which was a shame. I might still read the sequel for the Ghanaian setting alone though, which made The Missing American worth the read.

Title: Everyone In My Family Has Killed Someone
(Ernest Cunningham #1)
Author: Benjamin Stevenson
Genre: Mystery, Thriller, Crime
First published: March 29th 2022
Publisher: Mariner Books
Finished reading: May 5th 2024
Pages: 384

“Family is not whose blood runs in your veins, it’s who you’d spill it for.”

REVIEW

There has been a lot of hype around this title, and this is probably the main reason why it has taken me this long to finally pick up Everyone In My Family Has Killed Someone. I’m definitely kicking myself now though! I knew that I wanted to read this book as soon as I saw that eye-catching title, and the story itself ended up being everything I hoped it would be and more. This is such an unique and quirky thriller, and while it can go both ways depending on how you react to the writing style, I personally knew this was going to be a 5 star read for me almost straight away. There was just something about the writing style, tone and humor that was simply spot on for me, and I loved every single minute spent with this book. We see everything through the eyes of the main character Ernest, who basically narrates the story for us. This means random observations, quirks and humor incorporated along the way, and his voice was SO easy to warm up to. I loved the many bookish references  and the whole ‘how to write thrillers’ part, which only added to the unique feel of Everyone In My Family Has Killed Someone. This story might seem your typical locked room mystery with a bout of bad weather to boot, but it is also nothing like I’ve encountered before at the same time. The plot structure works really well and only adds to the suspense; the plot twists are well handled. I also loved how we not only have the present mystery, but also the mystery of who every Cunningham family member might have killed in the past. I can guarantee that Everyone In My Family Has Killed Someone will appear on my list of 2024 favorites, and I already can’t wait to read the sequel. Locked room trope, serial killer crime, bad weather, lots of bookish elements and references, humor… This story has it all and more.

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