This closed room mystery was a fun read – perfect for summer! We have a beautiful, slightly off the grid setting, a gaggle of Uni friends (including a nasty frenemy) and an intriguing story filled with secrets and betrayals as five university girlfriends get together after many years apart.

Things go from an initial awkward first meet to a drunken night of reminiscing followed by the friends waking up the next morning with one of them missing and the rest not remembering what happened. Secrets and personal conflicts start to emerge, motives are revealed, and fingers start to point as they each start to suspect each other.

The Girls Weekend by Jody Gehrman was a quick read and I loved the atmospheric, isolated (and posh) feel of the setting as well as the number of plausible motives due to the interpersonal conflicts between the characters. My only beef is that things slow down a bit in the middle and one character’s insistence on not calling the cops seemed a little overdone. Even though some characters were written better than others, this was a solid and enjoyable thriller that provides readers with great red herrings to keep them turning the pages.

Overall, I enjoyed Gehrman’s look at the close, complicated, and sometimes toxic parts of female friendship. I enjoyed the multiple suspects and even though I guessed whodunnit, I liked the journey through old friendships, secrets, and more baggage than Samsonite. You can put The Girls Weekend on hold at WPL now.

— Laurie P.