Book Review: The Resort by Sarah Goodwin

Partially set in the Bavarian Alps, The Resort is a thriller of husband betrayal and sisters´ competition. 

On the way to Jess, Mila´s sister wedding, somewhere in Bavaria, Mila and Ethan are getting lost in a no man´s land. Then, her husband dissapears and for days in a row Mila is roaming around an empty village, where she discovers corpses and human remains. As she is looking for a way out, she feels permanently watched and a fire destroys most of the cabins, implicitly the traces of murdered bodies too.

But Mila is escaping, thanks to some tourists that found her and is joining her sister where her disappeared husband was apparently looking for her. Shortly upon returning home though, there is a personal tragedy waiting for her, following a dramatic revelation that may jeopardize her life as she knew it.

The Resort has some unexpected spectacular twists that feels like wake up calls in the middle of a nap, and until the last chapter, there are new elements of the story revealed. However, I´ve felt sometimes there are so many stakes and the story is running faster than the installment of individual scenes. For instance, the days during which Mila is captive in the abandoned village, the scenes are lost into wanderings about mundane details that definitely are out of anyone´s mind when on emergency/survival mood. There are also assumptions that does not match the final results and the ambiance. Sometimes, the stakes are too high for what it is planned to happen and often, there is no sense of emergency as supposed by the situation in general.

The intermezzo focused on the relationship between the sisters does not prepare at all for the final installments and although the idea of the competition between the two is a reason enough to create tension and expectations, they end up in a lukewarm comfortable situation.

Overall, although there are many reasons to wait until the end what is happening in The Resort, it also creates expectations that are half met and therefore may leave the reader with the sour taste of non-honored promises.

Rating: 3 stars