The Most Wonderful Crime of the Year by Ally Carter is a 304 page standalone novel published in 2024.

Genre:

Romance, Mystery

Opening Line

Excerpt from the Official Police Interrogation of Margaret Chase and Ethan Wyatt

December 25

Mrs. Chase: Well, of course I have his blood on my hands.

Synopsis:

Knives Out gets a holiday rom-com twist in this rivals-to-lovers romance-mystery from New York Times bestselling author Ally Carter.

The bridge is out. The phones are down. And the most famous mystery writer in the world just disappeared out of a locked room three days before Christmas.

Meet Maggie Chase and Ethan Wyatt:

She’s the new Queen of the Cozy Mystery.

He’s Mr. Big-time Thriller Guy.

She hates his guts.

He thinks her name is Marcie (no matter how many times she’s told him otherwise.)

But when they both accept a cryptic invitation to attend a Christmas house party at the English estate of a reclusive fan, neither is expecting their host to be the most powerful author in the world: Eleanor Ashley, the Duchess of Death herself.

That night, the weather turns, and the next morning Eleanor is gone.

She vanished from a locked room, and Maggie has to wonder: Is Eleanor in danger? Or is it all some kind of test? Is Ethan the competition? Or is he the only person in that snowbound mansion she can trust?

As the snow gets deeper and the stakes get higher, every clue will bring Maggie and Ethan closer to the truth—and each other. Because, this Christmas, these two rivals are going to have to become allies (and maybe more) if they have any hope of saving Eleanor.

Assuming they don’t kill each other first.

My Thoughts:

This book was pretty good, but a bit confusing in that it seemed to try to be many kinds of stories all at once. Was it a murder mystery or a romance? Cozy and lighthearted comedy, or dark and twisty?

I was the most excited when I thought it was an elaborate game in which our characters, a colorful and eccentric group gathered at an English estate, were to compete against one another to be the first to solve a fabricated mystery. But then it winds up being about actual attempted murder, and being snowed in with a would-be killer who continues to create mayhem. Then the final answer to the murder mystery portion of the story seemed to kind of come out of left field (the motive is something that the reader is not aware of until the actual moment of the final reveal). And I hesitate to call it a locked room mystery, because you never actually get the answer to the how the missing person disappeared from the locked room.

But this book is actually mostly a romance. While I liked Maggie and Ethan each individually, the romance was actually a tad creepy (he has loved her from afar for years and is way, way too intimate way too fast for someone who has yet to receive any indication that his attentions are welcome). And Maggie repeatedly doubting and needing constant reassurance had me annoyed with her by the end.

This review sounds like mostly complaints, but really it wasn’t bad. Part of my issue, too, may be that I listened to this on audio, which doesn’t always work for me. There is one narrator for Maggie’s chapters (the majority of the book), and a separate one for Ethan’s chapters. One seems very talented in general, but has some very noticeable vocal fry. Both were a bit cringey when doing voices for the opposite gender, but one far moreso than the other. And they acted out some of the same characters quite differently (e.g. one of them portrays a particular character speaking in a bold and sassy manner, while the other acts her out as super timid). With all of these things taken together, I gave this one 3.75 stars, but it may have been a 4 if I had read it with my eyes instead of my ears.