West Heart Kill tells the story of Adam McInnis, a detective invited to a hunting club by a friend but has secretly been hired to investigate. Bodies keep piling up and no one can get in or out. Can Adam solve the murders before it is too late.

This was definitely not your conventional whodunit story. The book is riddled with facts and fun anecdotes to actual fictional books written by Agatha Christie and many other masters of the whodunit. The characters in this story are all pretty awful people and you learn that very early in the story. The writing style starts out pretty normal and the beginning of the book and derails more and more as the book goes on until the end where I, as the reader, was pretty confused about what was going on. I wish that the nonconventional parts of this books hadn't taken away from the story but, for me, it did at the end and that is the only thing that kept me from making it a 5 star. I love unique and untraditional and, if you do as well, this is a must read.

At an isolated hunting club, West Heart, during a stormy Bicentennial weekend, three bodies are found within four days. Private detective Adam McAnnis, visiting with an old college friend, encounters the gathering group of unfamiliar and somewhat unfriendly faces. As the first member's body is discovered by the lake, a major storm strikes. When the power returns on Sunday, two more deaths have occurred.

McDorman indeed deals out an unconventional murder mystery. Setting this at a remote and isolated location, convening a large group where everyone is a potential suspect — even the unpredictable detective on the case, is only part of the callbacks to classic mysteries that have come before. A debut that works in multiple genre conventions and tropes, McDorman walks a fine line between excessive pretentiousness and creative craftsmanship.

West Heart Kill is purposefully sensationalized at times, not unlike a soap opera mixed with a classic mystery. While he begins the story with third-person narration, with a playfully pointed tone, McDorman quickly slips into second-person, addressing the reader, where he delves into the most meta writing. A veritable checklist of what makes a book meta, McDorman runs the full gamut of defining and underscoring this writing strategy. West Heart Kill refers to itself as a book quite often and pervasively, and while none of the characters refer to knowledge of the book, the use of second-person (which begins with addressing the reader and blooms bigger from there), sets up the level of self-awareness that this book knows it's a book. Additionally, and the main ways in which it can be ascribed as meta, is the continued commentary on its own form as a mystery novel. And here is where I have my main beef with West Heart Kill.

When we're in the middle of the third-person narration and McAnnis is doing his detective thing, it's good. Really good. But the meta commentary goes a bit far. I love all the interruptions and casual bantering-esque tone that sports a full awareness of the tropes, highs and lows, of the mystery genre. However, the presumption levels took off and skyrocketed with his willingness to sacrifice the plots, twists, and methodologies of novels that DEFINE this genre. Assuming everyone has a modicum of awareness of Shakespeare is one thing, because outside of high school where many of us first experienced his works, not many readers sit down to dig into a Shakespearean play. But spoiling the stories — in a variety of ways and within a range of degrees — is nigh on unforgivable to me. Many Agatha Christie books (the Poirot series, in particular) were sacrificed in the concocting of this book. Raymond Chandler, Graham Greene, Patricia Highsmith were among the others (the list was long) also used and discarded.

If I'm being generous, it's as if he simply took a "cite your sources and examples" command a little too seriously and way too far. This is not the first work of fiction to do this, and it surely will not be the last, but I don't know how to break it to these authors, editors, and publishers, but there are approximately 10,000 babies born per day in the United States who come into this world with zero knowledge (full stop could be inserted here, but...) of Christie's oeuvre, and who may want to, at some point in the future, experience any given novel for themselves. Feel free to insert any author / filmmaker in place of Christie's name, INCLUDING Mr. McDorman and his novel here.

Because, speaking of, his reveal and twist is tempting to call out, but I'll simply say that I wasn't a fan and leave it at that.

Near the 80% mark, McDorman throws a curveball and slips in a dramatized structure complete with stage direction, parentheticals, dialogue, and technical notes. He's left the world of the third-person narration behind, and while he still returns to the moments of dissecting the genre and addressing the reader (though at this juncture he's switched to a first-person plural "we"), it is back to a script when he returns to the players. It's jarring at first, but it totally works...although it starts allowing that creeping suspicion that only grows with where he's going to end his novel, which is where he simply took his conceit too far.

One of those novels that infuriated me at the same time that I can recognize a large part of the writing, structure, and character development was above average, the wasteful discard of classic mysteries and the final reveal put me off, almost entirely.

This is not your average whodunnit mystery. While I loved the location of the affluent remote hunting club and the cast of characters I felt this experimental in some ways that didn't fully pay off. I have never read a mystery with the background inserts between chapters describing other mystery authors plots, tropes, histories and some times I found it interesting while other times it felt like page filler between the mystery. A wholly original ending that I did appreciate but did leave me scratching my head. Thank you Knopf, Pantheon, Vintage, and Anchor catalog and netgalley for the ARC.

Interesting characters and relationships that are revealed in twists and turns. All is not what it may seem.

West Heart Kill is my book of the year so far!

I know that meta crime fiction will not be to everyone's taste but I have always been a fan of this literary style and this book is an unbelievably good example of this sub-genre. The way everything was woven together is just brilliant and I can't imagine how much work has gone into the planning and execution of this story.

So entertaining, educational and sharp. It's everything I want from crime fiction. I won't go into detail about the plot because it's hard to know where to start but this is the perfect choice for anyone interested in the classic crime fiction backlist or anyone wanting to try something totally unique.

The West Heart club in upstate New York is an exclusive establishment. Tucked into secluded woods, Detective Adam McAnnis is lucky to secure an invitation through an old college friend for the Fourth of July weekend.

A secluded, exclusive cabin plus strangers who have a lot of history—it is only a matter of time before murder also makes an appearance.

This is not your standard locked room/secluded house mystery. McDorman unfurls to goings on at West Heart Kill, peppering the plot with a historical tidbits about the genre as a whole. Comments and questions are presented to the reader, allowing them to reflect on their own relationship to mystery books. But don’t forget that there’s still a crime for you to solve!

It’s a locked room mystery at a hunting club with a detective and multiple dead characters. The narrator keeps talking to the reader about how mysteries are written. I didn’t care about any of the characters and I was so disinterested I still don’t think I know whodunnit or is it whodiddit!
I think locked room mysteries are just not for me. If you enjoy them you may like this one.

Unfortunately this narration style did not work for me. The writer is speaking to the reader which for me took me out of the story. There were also elements of a play, which is just not my style. Other readers may enjoy this unique storytelling.
Thanks to NetGalley for the advanced reader copy.

The premise of this book was super interesting and despite some complaints I've seen in other reviews about the breaks in storyline for asides on the murder mystery genre, I actually enjoyed those portions of the book and found them to be creative in their execution. Unfortunately, the plot of the story itself dragged on a bit too long and I had lost interest by the time of the big reveal. With some faster pacing, I think this book would be stronger.

The writing style wasn't my favorite; I prefer not to be a part of the storyline and read about how the mystery unfolds. The structural shifts are intense.

I applaud authors for trying something new, something different...but this didn't work for me. At all. Instead of clever, the second-person, 4th-wall-breaking narrative came across as smarmy and pretentious, way too condescending and made me angry rather than intrigued.

There was a fantastic passage about authors who had rules they followed while writing and that Agatha Christie not only knew them all, but broke the whole lot of them. Unfortunately, every other time the story paused to break off into a mini essay on the history of mystery as a genre my mind wandered.

Ultimately this was a DNF -- I really wanted to champion this one but I had to call it quits.

Thank you to Knopf for letting me read WEST HEART KILL early. This one publishes on October 24.

The style of this book is either something you will love or hate. Unfortunately I hated it. I didn't want to pick it up ever. Maybe it's better on audio. Once it's released, I'll check out the audio from the library and report back.

Takes place over a long holiday weekend at an expansive private hunting club of the wealthy. Surprised me with twists, I didn’t see coming. Definitely not the usual murder mystery. At first I thought it was a bit odd. It’s like a a how-to-guide for writers inside a cleverly plotted whodunit. The more I got into it though, the more I enjoyed it, and I learned a lot about the mystery genre, one of my favorites. You read about its history; authors like Christie, Auden and Chandler to name a few; types like classic or locked room mysteries; and techniques of the trade like the dying message. Excellent writing and a unique concept take this murder mystery over the top. 5 stars

I finished reading "West Heart Kill" quite a while ago, and realized I hadn't left my review. When I looked at the summary for a refresher, I remembered why. This book "talks" to the reader in a manner that I found rather off-putting. Another reviewer used the word "self-referential," and that's exactly what it is. The author is doing more than telling a story; he is playing a game with his reader. And in some other novels, it really works. In this one, it doesn't, or at least it didn't for me.

I found myself skimming through the "lessons" interspersed between the story-telling chapters, because reading them was just frustrating and felt detracting. I enjoyed the storyline itself, about Detective Adam and his assignment to uncover what has been happening at the West Heart development. I would have enjoyed this more as a novella, i.e., without the game-play chapters.

3/5 stars

I tried but I couldn't get through this. The narration changes make things confusing and disrupts the flow of the book.. Overall everything is just chaotic and messy, the book does not flow and reads choppy.

This is presented in a highly unique style that made it difficult for me to connect with, not only the characters, but the story as a whole. I usually read a book from beginning to end within a couple of days if not hours but I found myself opening and closing this one in a battle to get it read. It was a bit exhausting for me. I believe there are readers who are going to love this style, but I’m looking for a more traditional read with great twists and not one that I have to work so hard to enjoy.

Thank you, NetGalley and Knopf, for providing me with a complimentary digital copy of this book for review.

West Heart Kill presents a captivating and unconventional approach to the murder mystery genre. Allow me to delve into the heart of the story itself. The investigation led by Adam McAniss compels me to question the motives of each couple and their children. None of the characters possess likable qualities, leaving everyone under suspicion. As a reader, my insatiable desire to unearth their hidden secrets intensifies.

However, the narrative style employed in this novel occasionally proves to be a distraction. Initially, an omniscient narrator emerges, which can be jarring when it begins to dictate my emotions. This point of view then shifts sporadically to a third-person perspective. Furthermore, the narrative sometimes pauses to provide insights into the realm of mystery writing and writers. While I appreciate these informative digressions, they impede the overall pace of the story. Lastly, the climactic revelation occurs within the confines of a play script, delving further into familial conflicts and financial issues.

West Heart Kill offers a murder mystery not bound by convention. It presents intriguing twists in its storytelling.

QUICK TAKE: I loved it. I think true fans of the whodunnit genre will love it. I think the ending will REALLY upset some people, but I was kinda into it (and I'm frankly still thinking about it). It's basically KNIVES OUT meets THE ICE STORM. Cool new author to keep an eye on.

{2.5/5}

CW: suicide, drug use, abuse, Nazis, death of a dog, mild gore/violence, some others

Read as an ARC via NetGalley. Book publishes October 24, 2023

I struggled with rating this book. I also struggled to finish it, but we’ll get to that in a moment. Normally, a book that is written decently but whose story I didn’t love, or a book whose story was amazing but had less than thrilling writing backing it up, would earn a 3. A 3 falls right in the middle of my 1-5 scale; it’s like a really comfy armchair with one leg too short—a tolerable experience, but not as good as it could have been. By writing standards, this book should have at least earned a 3. There’s no doubt in my mind that the author possesses an immense talent for putting together strings of words. It’s scattered all throughout the story, little bits and pieces of skill sitting right there on the page for you to notice and appreciate. But the actual execution of the story? It made me dread picking the book back up to finish.

I don’t even know that I can really give an accurate synopsis of the story because I’m not entirely sure what it really ended up being. It was supposed to be a “rich people getaway whodunit” set in the 1970’s, but it ended up feeling more like “a study of mystery as a genre” rather than an actual mystery story.

The narrative style is what really threw off my groove with this book. I’m sure some people will really enjoy it, but I just found it irritating. The narrator changes throughout, sometimes as the detective, predominately as the author, occasionally as another member of the character list (though not identified). The actual story is interspersed with asides that document the history of how ‘mystery’ developed as a genre, or on the origins of the word ‘murder,’ or innumerable other things. While an interesting tactic for turning the reader’s attention to a lot of possibilities at once, it severely threw off the flow of the story, and if you were to take out all the asides we’d be left with an incredibly short tale. Unfortunately, the tone that these in-between scenes were conveyed in also went from ‘snobby, but it works’ to ‘incredibly irritating’ quite rapidly. It felt like a remote surveillance by the author of their own story, facetious and high-handed enough to border on purple prose without fully crossing the line, that somehow works as a plot device and yet pulls you out of the flow of the story at the same time.

I wanted to love the story, I really did. For me, though, it ended up feeling like someone had taken the bare bones of detective story, filled it with an incredibly unlikable and one-dimensional cast, cut and paste background research in at random intervals, rounded it out with an altogether unsatisfying conclusion, and tied everything up with discordantly well executed writing. Personally, this wasn’t a favorite, but if experimental fiction is your thing, and you’re okay with a little fictional whiplash, this might be the book for you.

Lots and lots and lots of potential that missed the mark at every turn for me. The history of the genre interwined with a murder mystery is an excellent idea. And I am all for bending the rules when it comes to the storytelling, so the non-traditional narrative style worked for me in many places. But while the author made interesting and discussion-worthy points about the are of creating a mystery novel, the novel itself got in the way. Or maybe it was the other way around? Either way the characters mean nothing to us, and the conclusions feel bland.

The author works so hard to create the framework they forgot to fill it in. It often felt like he relied on the tricks to mask the lack of actual storytelling. More time was needed on developing the characters and less time telling the reader what they were thinking. (This literally happens throughout the book.) What I was actually thinking was "Give us more Emma!" she is the most interesting character in the book, and her moments with the Detective were the most enjoyable for me. Like in so many books before, the women are the best parts and know all the secrets, but are ignored in order to highlight the pursuits of men.

We get it, the author is clever. I just wished he had spent less time trying to convince of us that. I wanted to hang out with and know more from the characters of West Heart. The young boy who has secret access, binoculars, and a meticulous map? Let's get more chapters from his perspective. Generations of tantalizing love triangles between families that repeat in loops for decades? Let's dig into that juicy gossip! Ruinous family secrets tucked under floorboards in vacation homes!? Someone hand me a hammer! I may be greedy but I want my clever, playful, insightful structural games to come with solid storytelling and satisfying conclusions.

Thank you to Netgalley for letting me read this book early!