Ben Guterson: The Mysteries of Winterhouse (Macmillan Publishing Group 2020)
You may have already read the first book of the Winterhouse series on BogiWrites before Christmas. Although the first two volumes in the series take place during the Winter Holidays, the story of the final piece of the trilogy begins in March and lasts until Easter, making it a perfect spring reading.
Elizabeth Somers now has her home at the Winterhouse Hotel and goes to a local school, which she likes much more than her previous one. The spring break has just begun, and Elizabeth is looking forward to the joyful chaos of the Hotel. Her best friend Freddy is also arriving with his parents and everything would be perfect, but some guests are starting to behave oddly, and unnatural tremors shake the Hotel…
Various puzzles also play important role in this book. Ben Guterson himself is very fond of wordplay: he also wrote the puzzles of the book himself. In the trilogy, each chapter begins with a puzzle that relates to the events of the chapter: in the first part there are word ladders, in the second there are anagrams, and here we find the words hidden in the chapter titles. In addition to the mystical events, the story recalls a classic crime scene with a number of possible suspects. According to the author’s own confession, it was difficult to write the conclusion of the trilogy, as he wanted to solve all the questions raised so far, and also write a story that could be enjoyable on its own. This is a complicated task because he did not want to slow down the novel’s plot with explanations, but he also did not want to leave unsewn threads. In my opinion, it went very well: the book has a very pleasant atmosphere, but it was also exciting because of the investigation of the mysteries. What I particularly liked is that Elizabeth seems like a completely real little girl from nowadays who reads new books, like Nevermoor or The Book Scavengers series.
Ben Guterson’s new book will be released in this April, in which a family moves to the countryside to recover from a great tragedy and the kids here mingle in various adventures.
If you would like to learn more about the writer, visit his website:
Ben Guterson: https://benguterson.com/
