I was hoping to save Do You See What I See? for the holiday season, but I was far too eager. Peter Swanson delivers another wonderful Christmas thriller novella for us to consume in a single sitting. A twisty, and uniquely written story that had me guessing to the very end, one that also made me upset I didn’t come up with the idea over Swanson.
When author Nicholas Child is dropped by his publisher, his agent sends him to spend the holidays at the Cape Cod mansion of her other client, Marco Tavares. Marco needs to finish the long-overdue follow-up to his bestselling novel, and Nicholas is going to help him.
But when Nicholas arrives at Marco’s sprawling seaside estate, which is decked out in twinkling lights and a towering Christmas tree, he finds himself in the middle of a gathering where holiday cheer is in short supply—and every visitor seems to have a motive to kill their host.
Along with Marco and his wife Maeve—who are currently sleeping in separate rooms—also present is Marco’s oddball sister, near-silent grandmother, ex-girlfriend and her jealous husband, and long-suffering best friend, Billy Sousa. The most intriguing guest is named James Beers, another writer who believes that Marco’s bestselling novel was based on one of his ideas.
As Christmas Day approaches, a single boozy night culminates in two corpses, and Nicholas becomes convinced that the whole thing was a setup from the start.
Novellas don’t always do it for me, as sometimes there isn’t enough time to set up the story and nail the ending. But what surprised me even more about Do You See What I See? was the story itself isn’t even long. The way Swanson tells the story expands to the novella length and is what has the lasting impact after you close the book. The author uses a unique format to tell this mystery in what is describe as a slow burn thriller, that we are used to with Swanson, but somehow is also face-paced at the same time.
There is this sense of obviousness to the setup in this story that really had me wanting to know more. The book is setup with characters, reasoning, and time of year for a perfect murder mystery and those in the book see it as well. Surely nothing bad could happen when it’s so obvious, but that’s what made it so special. The setup right before your eyes makes for a thrilling story to unfold.
While the beginning and middle of the story were entertaining, its the last third of the book that made it for me. What typically is the story just unfolding to a point were the mystery is revealed, Swanson has a way of retelling the story in various new lights which reveals more and more each time until we know, for the most part, what happened all along. It’s captivating and entertaining for sure.
Do You See What I See? is a clever Christmas mystery novella that kept finding new ways to surprise me up until the very end. Peter Swanson continues to prove he knows his way around Christmas thrillers, telling them in only a few pages. Do You See What I See? is a quick and entertaining read that I could not put down, reading in nearly one sitting.
Do You See What I See? is available at bookstores everywhere from William Morrow. The audiobook, narrated by Graham Halstead, is available via Libro.fm!
