**4.5 stars**

What a perfect summer mystery! If you’re going on vacation or just wish you were this is the perfect mystery to transport you somewhere else. Honestly I had to google where exactly Big Sur is in California but I sure felt like I was there while reading The Unwedding. I loved Ellery, Ravi, Nina, and all of the other fully realized characters. The resort itself is definitely a character as well. Plus I didn’t have a clue who the killer was. Highly recommend!

My only complaint and the reason I didn’t give it 5 stars is Ellery’s pining over her ex-husband, but what do I know I’ve never been married at all much less for 20 years.

Thanks to the author and publisher for the e-arc I received in exchange for my honest review.

To the publisher, there was one noticeable continuity error where she describes her son as having big brown eyes then the scene at the lake with the wand he has beautiful blue eyes like the water, I hope that is fixed in the final version.

3.5 stars. Ellery is blindsided when her husband asks for a divorce before their 20th anniversary. She decides to go on their pre-planned anniversary trip so it doesn’t go to waste. She makes a few friends and even crashes a wedding event on site. Trying to have a good time becomes hard to do when she finds a dead body in the pool. It won’t be the first one on the trip either. A bad weather storm prevents anyone from entering/leaving the resort, so Ellery and others on the site work to figure out who is killing guests.

This was a fun read. It was definitely more cozy mystery vibes vs. thriller. I didn’t really have any good theories, just read and learned alongside Ellery - which I didn’t mind! I also appreciated how it wasn’t easy to guess. The ending was longer than needed though, with a lot of dialogue and explaining - plus additional plot added at the end that wasn’t necessary. It kinda felt like a Scooby Doo reveal; however, I enjoyed the ride!

As a fan of Ally Condie's YA books, I was quick to request this book and I enjoyed it. There was a good mystery and it moved at a pretty steady pace. I wasn't exactly sure where things were going to go, so that was a nice surprise! I hate when the endings are obvious and I didn't really see this coming. Thank you netgalley for this arc in exchange for my honest opinion.

I really really enjoyed this one! This is a locked-room destination thriller set at a luxury resort on the Big Sur coastline. The main character, Ellery, is vacationing solo on her planned 20th anniversary trip soon after her husband has asked for a divorce. On her first night at the resort, she is invited to dine with some other travelers and they crash an pre-wedding cocktail party. The next morning, a member of the wedding part is found dead, the wedding is called off, and a major storm has cut the resort off from the mainland. Ellery and her new friends are now pulled into the wedding party's drama in a quest to solve the murder. However, new victims start to fall, power/food/and supplies dwindle, and tensions mount in a race for survival.

The author does such an amazing job at creating a sense of foreboding and tension; every.single.interaction between Ellery and other resort guests put me on edge. Who to trust, how the guests might be interconnected, and what to believe was an involving part of the story. The fear and tension was expertly executed, and I could not set this one aside until the mystery was resolved. A highly propulsive thriller with a dream-like setting makes this the perfect book to slip into your pool or beach bag!

I read this one and did the audiobook. This is the review for the Ebook. This is amazing! Our girl is on a vacation that was meant to be for her 20th wedding anniversary but she is recently divorced instead. She is traveling alone. She instantly starts making friends because she is nice and she is starting to enjoy the trip when she finds a corpse in the pool. Oh no! It is the groom from the wedding that was supposed to take place at the resort. So sad!
She wants to know what happened and she is kind of looking into it, when another body is found. Lots and lots secrets about the wedding party are revealed. She also befriends staff and other guests and learns a lot about herself.
It was so beautiful! I especially loved the ending.

As a teenager, I loved Ally Condie’s Matched series so much! So when I saw she wrote an adult novel, I had to read it! The Unwedding has a White Lotus meets Agatha Christie vibe. When the body of the groom at a resort wedding is discovered and a mudslide blocks the roads, it’s clear something horrible is brewing at the Resort at Broken Point. Everyone has a secret and Condie takes the reader on a thrilling ride to discover them!

4.5 ⭐️s!

Really enjoyed this one. First time reading an Ally Condie book and won’t be my last. I thought the pacing was good and the premise was interesting. A thriller/murder mystery set at a luxury Big Sur resort while a wedding is supposed to happen was right up my alley. There was depth to the characters and the banter between them all was great. Couldn’t get enough of Ravi and Nina!

I also loved how she weaved in the FMC, Ellery’s, past and a particular memory of a tragic event throughout the book and the main storyline. And her personal struggles throughout the book I could see being so relatable. I kept wondering how everything was going to connect in the end, and I actually like how we got a ton of answers regarding different things.

Definitely recommend! Thank you to Grand Central Publishing and Netgalley for this ARC.

After an unexpected divorce, Ellery attends a luxury resort by herself. Why let their planned vacation go to waste? When she finds a dead body in the pool, a mudslide also traps her and the other guests.

If you like locked door mysteries, this may be for you. It’s got all the perfect makings for a locked room: luxurious resort, mysterious artwork, unlikeable characters, and a woman you root for from the beginning. The middle of book was slow for me but I stuck with it. I really wanted Ellery to make out alright.

“It was easy to forget yourself out here. It was easy to forget what you had done. What you still might do.”

The Unwedding comes out 6/4.

THE UNWEDDING
Ally Condie

My first Ally Condie, won’t be my last.

Ellery is stranded in some hotel in Big Sur her ex-husband wanted to go to. She is there solo. The room and vacation were booked when they were still together. To celebrate an anniversary that never happened. She’s a little grief-stricken, even lonelier than she anticipated, and just her luck there is a big wedding taking place where she is staying.

When a storm rolls in, the wedding party and other hotel guests are stranded without help coming anytime soon. Just when Ellery thinks things can’t get any worse, they do, and she discovers a dead body floating in the pool.

Now they’re stranded, someone’s dead, and Ellery wishes she had never come to Big Sur in the first place. Just as the full gravity of her situation settles in another body is found. And this solo vacation turns into a group nightmare. We follow along as she discovers she may not be safe in this hotel, amongst these strangers.

Will she figure out who is responsible for the deaths before she becomes the next victim?

There are a lot of characters, but luckily nothing is confusing due to how the characters are introduced. Condie clarifies who to focus on and who you can put in the background. I loved the pace of the writing. It was confident and swift.

I had a lot of fun with this thriller/mystery. It being set on the cliffs of Big Sur really helped me to visualize where they might be and how it might look as the novel unfolded. With a dash of devious humor, unforgettable characters, and an artistic side plot, I can easily recommend THE UNWEDDING by Ally Condie.

Thanks to Netgalley and Grand Central Publishing for the advanced copy! It was a pleasure!

THE UNWEDDING...⭐⭐⭐⭐

I DNFed this book at 30%. I wanted to love it. The plot and setting seemed fantastic. But I just couldn't get into the story (it felt very slow) and didn't find the characters or dialogue to be very believable. I'm sure others will love this book though; it just wasn't for me.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC.

I honestly don't know how I feel about The Unwedding after finishing it. It wasn't great, but it wasn't necessarily bad either. I think, overall, it just fell flat.


Ellery and Luke recently divorced. Instead of letting their non-refundable 20th anniversary trip go to waste, Ellery decided to travel on her own. She quickly becomes friends with two other travelers, and all seems to be going fine until Ellery finds a body floating in the pool. Then a major storm causes a devastating mudslide and all outside communication is cut off from the resort. Another body is found, someone else goes missing, art starts disappearing... a lot happens very quickly. For whatever reason, Ellery- who has no detective or investigator experience- teams up with her new friends to uncover what's really going on at the resort.

The premise sounds fantastic, right?

This book just didn't live up to it's potential. For a story that had so much happening, it certainly dragged on. I also wasn't a fan of how the author literally laid everything out at the end; I don't think every detail should have to be explained to the reader for the audience to understand the twists and events that unfolded. The characters themselves were alright.... to a degree. I'm still confused about Grace and her Dad (why was she so protective of him? What does being a certified Wilderness First Responder mean if she doesn't have medical training? Why wasn't she part of the search and rescue efforts if that was literally part of her job description?). Ben was made out to be this super nice guy, which is great I guess, but he had literally no character flaws or personality. Ravi and Nina were my favorites, but I'm still questioning the reveal about Nina's reason to visit the resort. Honestly, I'm questioning a lot of the details that were included... I'm not sure why any of it was included when it didn't strengthen or add to the plot and it didn't make the characters any more likable/understood.

And as far as the twist goes.... I didn't guess the identity of the murderer correctly, but it also didn't surprise me when it was revealed. The reveal itself was.... I don't want to say it was boring, but it was definitely uninteresting at best.

I loved the setting, however. I also liked the incorporation of art, even if the art theft portion seemed a little unnecessary. I liked Ellery as a character for the most part, except for all the rambling about her divorce and her kids. I know that was a big part of her backstory and was supposed to lend to the growth that the character goes through, but all the complaining was just redundant and annoying, I liked her strength and resiliency, though, and I think she was fairly well written.

I don't know. I didn't particularly like this book, but I didn't dislike it either. It just wasn't memorable. For a thriller, it was missing much of the thrill.


Thank you NetGalley and Grand Central Publishing for this ARC in exchange for an honest review.

I absolutely adore anything by Ally Condie and was so excited to see her writing an adult title! The mystery and tension were just right, and the main character’s struggles were so heartbreaking and relatable, Can’t wait to buy this one for my library and recommend it to students and fellow librarians. I loved that it was adult but without any content I would hesitate to share with students….please publish more like this! (And a whole series of mysteries from Ally, please…our new contemporary Agatha Christie!)

A slow-burn thriller that was super atmospheric and fun. Lots of twists and I loved the third person narration.

I really liked this. There was a lot of mystery. I had no idea who the killer was the whole time. I liked Ellery the main character and felt for her for her divorce and the other trauma she suffered. This book really held my attention and I could not put it down.

The Unwedding" by Ally Condie is set in the captivating yet foreboding landscape of Big Sur, where a seemingly ordinary gathering quickly turns into a gripping murder mystery with a modern twist, echoing elements of Agatha Christie and "The White Lotus."

The story centers on Ellery, recently divorced, who becomes entangled in a murder investigation during what was meant to be a celebratory weekend. While the pacing and some character developments may falter, Condie’s strong prose and atmospheric setting keep the reader engaged.

Despite some abrupt twists and a few unsatisfying conclusions, the novel offers a compelling mix of suspense and exploration of human resilience. "The Unwedding" is a promising adult fiction debut for Condie, appealing to those who enjoy a complex, twist-filled thriller.


Thank you to Grand Central Publishing and NetGalley for my advance reader copy all opinions are my own.

Solid concept for a destination thriller/murder mystery, with a beautiful resort location in Big Sur that ends up getting damaged by a storm, trapping the guests and staff, including those there to attend a wedding. Ellery is there it celebrate her 20th anniversary - alone - while still recovering from a past trauma. The first half of book was very good, but then it kind of fell apart for me. The reveal of the story of Ellery's past accident was too slow and underwhelming, and there were too many other reveals at the end. I didn't care about the art theft side mystery, people's motives were confusing, and honestly, there were too many characters to keep track of, which usually isn't an issue for me.

I liked the nature elements in this, I liked Ellery as a main character, and all the different elements were super interesting but in the end I was still questioning the relevance of a lot of items and didn't find that I had all the answers to all my questions

THanks to net galley, the author and the publisher for the ARC

Unfortunately I am having a hard time keeping track of people and getting interested in any of them. So I will be DNFing at 25%

This was my first read by Ally Condie, so I didn't know what to expect going in. I was more intrigued by the aesthetic cover and the fact that it was a locked room/remote setting thriller. Unfortunately, there was nothing in the plot to set it apart from every other resort, ski lodge, and hotel mystery...

There are a lot of characters in this book, and I feel like they all kind of fall flat. We are given some insight into their pasts and personalities, but since there are so many, it's hard to feel any connections with them. Ellery, the protagonist, seems especially dull in that she really doesn't contribute anything unique even though she gets the limelight for this story. She also doesn't seem particularly smart despite the fact that she is somehow one of the lead investigators for this mystery. Lastly, this book is under 350 pages, but it just feels so long and dragged out. The author writes a lot about how emotive the characters are (e.g.: raised eyebrows, posture, tone of voice) which does help to visualize it, but it significantly slowed the plot pace.

Ellery and her husband were supposed to spend a romantic anniversary at a remote resort together, but their marriage has recently ended in divorce. Not wanting to waste the trip, Ellery goes alone and tries to enjoy herself despite the fact that the place is overrun with wedding guests. When she stumbles upon the groom, dead in the pool, Ellery is sucked into the whirlwind of solving the murder.

With an Ordinary storyline and Uninspiring characters, this thriller Dragged for me.

Atmospheric, compelling, and bristling with characters who come fully alive. An intimate thriller worth savoring.