The Unwedding by Ally Condie

 A lovely resort in Big Sur, a private wedding, a huge rainstorm mudslide, and a murder...

Ellery Wainwright goes solo to the Resort at Broken Point in Big Sur, California, following a sudden and devasting divorce. The trip was already paid for, intended to be the perfect place for she and Luke to celebrate twenty years of marriage, so Ellery decides to go on alone. It so happens that her stay isn't anything like she expected. Initially, a wedding is canceled when the bride is left standing at the altar. Then the first dead body is discovered. Things get worse when the resort is cut off due to a deluge washing out a bridge preventing anyone getting in or out. When yet another guest dies, it becomes clear that things are not at all what they seem and some of those there are not good people. 

This started out OK with Ellery meeting and making friends with the guests at the resort. Lots of different characters are introduced but it's like almost instant friendship which seemed a bit strange. Of course, most all the people staying there have secrets or are lying. I just never warmed to Ellery as she wallowed a lot in her post-divorce misery, missing her kids, or hints about a past trauma. She was ingratiating herself at every turn and getting into everyone's business. Many of the others were stereotypes and not all were explored or fully developed enough.  

Then, the story went haywire at about 80% when these sudden complete confessions were taking place out in the woods. The ensuing action and behavior of the characters was quite unbelievable and contrived. I just never bought into Ellery being so clever or so popular and all of the people just laying the whole thing out like an outline. And all the motivations were quite lame. Definitely need to suspend a ton of disbelief to buy into the big twists and reveals. It lost me.

I was able to listen to the audiobook while following along in the e-book ARC provided by the publisher. The narrator, Christine Lakin, did a decent job with voicing all the characters, but this book had so many that the performance would have benefited from having a larger cast of narrators.

This is a standalone debut and not part of any series. Author previously wrote mostly YA novels and this is her first book aimed for adult audience.

Genre - mystery thriller, contemporary