VANTAGE POINT, good times don't get better than watching rich people dally and fall

VANTAGE POINT
SARA SLIGAR
MCD x FSG (non-affiliate Amazon link)
$14.99 ebook, available now

Rating: 3.75* of five

The Publisher Says: Succession meets Megan Abbott in this seductive Gothic suspense novel about the dramatic downfall of one of America’s most affluent families.

The old-money Wieland family has it all—wealth, status, power. They’re also famously cursed. Clara and her brother Teddy grew up on a small island in Maine in the shadow of their parents’ tragic deaths, haunted by rumors and paparazzi. Fourteen years later they’ve mostly put their turbulent past to rest. Teddy has married Clara’s best friend, Jess, and the three of them have moved back home to take over the sprawling, remote family mansion known as Vantage Point. Then Teddy decides to run for the Senate—an unnerving prospect made much worse when intimate videos of Clara are leaked online. The most frightening part is that she doesn't remember filming any of them. Are the videos real? Or are they deepfakes? Is someone trying to take down the Wielands once and for all?

Everyone thinks Clara is losing her grip on reality, but she knows the videos are only the beginning. Years ago the curse destroyed her parents. Now it’s coming for her. Brimming with palpable tension, Vantage Point reveals a twisted web of family secrets and political ambition that raises questions about the blurred lines between public and private personas and the nature of truth in the digital age.

I RECEIVED A DRC FROM THE PUBLISHER VIA NETGALLEY. THANK YOU.

My Review: Do I hope this is what happens to the richest .01% of families? Yes. Would I sit by and watch with huge schadenfreude while amplifying the most embarrassing, hurtful moments on social media despite the pain it might cause the family in question? Oh my goddesses YES! Extra speedy sharing if they issue statements deploring the hurtful invasion of privacy, and I'll find a way to automate the 24-hour-a-day posting process if they're tech scum!

This book and me? Destined to be besties.

Sounds like a five-star rave is incoming, doesn't it?

Nope. When the shock-twist ending is the same ending you've been telegraphing all along, you don't get five stars. It could be some meta thing, playing on my expectations for a twist in a thriller by not giving me one; I don't tend to read thrillers for that sort of playfulness (which is usually disappointing and annoying anyway). Why it bothered me was that the author was flagging the ending in what felt like every chapter, most unsubtly; then that's what happened; so why'd I read all this intermediate red-herring-ing?

Because this gothic, soapy, OTT strange-fest was fun. I liked reading it. It wasn't groundbreaking, or paradigm-shifting; no one promised me it would be. I was told I'd have a good time eagerly watching the twisted ending of a hypercapitalist family.

Check.

Would I have liked it more, if...fill in personal crotchet here? Sure, I can play that game all day and most of the night with almost anything. But this book delivers what it promises, and you'll have a good time getting there.