Confessions of a Murder Suspect by James Patterson and Maxine Paetro

This review will contain spoilers.

I’m not sure if it’s because I’ve read a lot of thrillers now and can identify the typical formulas used, but I found the ending of this one pretty predictable and wasn’t surprised. Having said that, I loved the pacing and the build-up towards the final revelation. Patterson and Paetro did a clever job setting up the narrative to make us believe there was someone who committed the murder (I genuinely thought it was their uncle for a good few chapters), when in actuality it was the characters’ parents themselves who took their own lives with poison.

The narrative itself is really unrealistic, but that's what made it so easy for me to get through. What are the odds your family is insanely prestigious, owns a pharmaceutical company, and makes you take a set of super-enhanced pills under the guise of daily vitamins? The possibility is there, but I think it’s a little over the top. It was interesting to see how all these ideas, alongside the concept of the ‘tiger mum, tiger dad’ and the children’s “quirks”, came together in the end.

I liked how the narrative is purely told through Tandy (Tandoori) Angel’s perspective. She frequently reminds us that she is an unreliable narrator and that we shouldn’t trust her. Yet as the story progresses, she slowly gains our trust as she gradually reveals secrets and backstories of her relationship with certain characters that have shaped them into who they are today, and which could have contributed to the murder. This entire point of view is character development for Tandy. Her “daily vitamins” supposedly inhibit her ability to feel and display emotions. However, as she stops taking them, she expresses more and more of her feelings with us and feels more comfortable sharing about her past.

There are several instances in this book where the plot twists took me by surprise, with the most notable one being Malcom sleeping with Matthew’s girlfriend. That made me give the biggest “wtf?!” reaction, but I slowly began to understand why it occurred after finding out more about the rest of the family (the mother, in particular, had her own hidden secrets). All the children had their motives, some a little more convincing than others, but I ultimately believed none of them were the real culprits and were just victims in their parents’ tragedy.

Overall, Confessions of a Murder Suspect was a 4-star read. It was good but not great. It’s a fun read if you need a palate cleanser or something to break up all the dense books you’re reading. It’s definitely gotten me back into the thriller genre again, but I wouldn’t read this one a second time.