Review: The Search Party

Title: The Search Party

Author: Hannah Richell

Publisher: 3rd January 2024 by Simon & Schuster Australia

Pages: 352 pages

Genre: mystery, thriller, suspense

Rating: 4.5 cups

Synopsis:

Five old friends reunite for an idyllic glamping holiday on the rugged Cornwall coast, but tensions rise when a storm leaves them stranded and someone goes missing. Max and Annie Kingsley have left the London rat race with their twelve-year-old son to set up a glamping site in the wilds of Cornwall. 

Eager for a dry run ahead of their opening, they invite three old university friends and their families for a long-needed reunion and a relaxing weekend. But the festivities soon go awry as tensions arise between the children (and subsequently their parents), explosive secrets come to light, and a sudden storm moves in, cutting them off from help as one in the group disappears.  

Moving between a police investigation, a hospital room and the catastrophic weekend, The Search Party is a propulsive destination thriller about the tenuous bonds of friendship and the lengths parents will go to protect their children.

My Thoughts

I have read and loved Hannah’s previous books, so it was with great anticipation that I opened The Search Party and I was not disappointed. Such a well written and atmospheric story that will have you frantically turning pages to a most fitting and suspenseful ending. 

‘She keeps asking herself, how could one weekend spiral so dreadfully out of control?’

Basically this is a glamping trip that goes horribly wrong! Told from multiple points of view and moving back and forth in time, Hannah is very clear on character voice and timelines (she even includes a list of names) and pay attention to chapter dates so as never to be confused. The two timelines are the weekend away itself and then interspersed with police interviews in the aftermath. This is such an extremely clever technique in drip feeding character and plot clues along the way. 

‘Maybe their reunion weekend had brought the wildest, truest sides out in all of them  - one way or another.’

Three families are partaking in this glamping experience for the weekend and the various dynamics between the characters and has much to do with how events play out. There are disagreements, past histories, missing campers all played against a raging storm on the Cornwall coast. Tension builds, tempers fray, friendships are strained and it all comes to a raging and violent conclusion inline with the storm. 

‘It was as if the elemental wildness of the place had got under his skin, altered him. All his emotions rising to the surface.’

The Search Party is such a suspenseful and entertaining read you will find it hard to put down. There are many dramas and unfolding layers that will keep you on the edge of your seat and guessing to a fitting conclusion. 

‘In that moment, twenty years of friendship, of camaraderie, of pints in pubs and late-night bonding over music, of toasting each other’s weddings and children, of standing shoulder-to-shoulder through life’s ups and downs went skittering away on the wind.’

This review is based on a complimentary copy from the publisher in exchange for an honest review. Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own. The quoted material may have changed in the final release.