Review: Everyone this Christmas has a Secret by Benjamin Stevenson

Benjamin Stevenson’s mystery novels about amateur sleuth and lover of Golden Age murder mysteries Ernest Cunningham have been super popular but I just hadn’t managed to pick one up yet. When I spotted Benjamin on the schedule for the ANU’s ‘Meet the Author’ event series – in conversation with lovely local author Jack Heath no less (if you ever get the chance to see Jack speak at an event please go – he’s wonderful and funny and engaging in front of adults and kids alike) – it was the perfect excuse to finally read one. The subject of the discussion was the newest release in the series, Everyone this Christmas has a Secret – you can actually listen here if you’d like to check it out – I’ve popped the blurb below followed by my thoughts on the book.

What is Benjamin Stevenson’s Everyone this Christmas has a Secret about?

My name’s Ernest Cunningham. I used to be a fan of reading Golden Age murder mysteries, until I found myself with a haphazard career getting stuck in the middle of real-life ones. I’d hoped, this Christmas, that any self-respecting murderer would kick their feet up and take it easy over the holidays. I was wrong.

So here I am, backstage at the show of world-famous magician Rylan Blaze, whose benefactor has just been murdered. My suspects are all professional tricksters: masters of the art of misdirection.

THE MAGICIAN
THE ASSISTANT
THE EXECUTIVE
THE HYPNOTIST
THE TWIN
THE COUNSELLOR
THE STAGEHAND

My clues are even more abstract: A suspect covered in blood, without a memory of how it got there; A murder committed without setting foot inside the room where it happens; And an advent calendar. Because, you know, it’s Christmas.

If I can see through the illusions, I know I can solve it.

After all, a good murder is just like a magic trick, isn’t it?

My thoughts on Everyone this Christmas has a Secret

I have to start by saying what a delightful package this book is. The edition I picked up is a slim hard cover, and it is so beautiful under the dust jacket. The end papers are also stunning! I think being presented so beautifully makes a book an extra lovely to give as a gift. The premise of the book, in terms of structure, is very clever too as it is set up like an advent calendar with one chapter to read each day of December in the lead up to Christmas Day. I did have a small issue with this, however, as I just can’t understand how anyone could possibly have the willpower to read this one chapter at a time – I found it too good to put down!

Everything about this book was actually very clever – the way Ern speaks to the reader, as the premise is that the book is his recording of what has happened, the clues given at the end of each chapter, the foreshadowing of parts of the story that just kept me so intrigued, the setting that limits the suspects in a locked-room kind of way, and details of the crime and its solving by Ern. All of it so so good. I loved that Ern tells the reader when we have all the clues and gives us a chance to solve it before he does his big reveal. I read this with some friends and had so much fun sharing theories between chapters and being completely stumped and then mind-blown by the answer. When I finished the book I handed it to my husband immediately so I could talk with him about it too (I didn’t have to wait long – he read it in two or three days).

I’m not sure what else to say about this one because I don’t want to give anything away, but I just had such fun with it, from the event and meeting Benjamin to the actual reading, to the discussions with friends – it has been an extra little source of Christmassy joy for me this year, and I’m so keen to catch up on Ern’s other adventures now!

Let me know in the comments if you’ve read this one too, or if you’re planning to pick it up!

xo Bron
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Everyone this Christmas has a Secret by Benjamin Stevenson
Out now from Penguin Books Australia
Source: I bought this one for myself ahead of attending Benjamin’s fabulous launch of the book with Jack Heath at ANU (you can check out the conversation as a podcast here).
Category: Australian Christmassy contemporary murder mystery fiction

Everyone this Christmas has a Secret on The StoryGraph and Goodreads

Keep up with the latest from Benjamin Stevenson on his website here.

Want more Christmassy books? Click here.