by Rebecca Heath
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing, 2025
Review
by Rachel Spencer
The Wedding Party is the third thriller by Rebecca Heath, but the first that I have read. The novel is set in the fictional South Australian town of Refuge Bay, where some of the families of the main characters used to spend their childhood summer holidays. Other characters live in Refuge Bay permanently. Times have changed since their ‘long, carefree days in the sunshine’; a tragic death has forever altered their lives. The reader discovers in the first chapter that Adele, the bride-to-be, once had a boyfriend called Oliver (Ollie) Rhodes who died twelve years ago.
The story opens a week before Adele’s wedding to Jason. The scene is set in an expensive bridal shop. ‘[T]he playlist … is on its second rotation…, and the ice holding the celebratory champagne is melting.’ Adele’s maid of honour and best friend, Katja, asks, ‘Tell me again why you even have this Sophie-fucking-Rhodes chick as a bridesmaid?’ Here Heath flings the first barb into the nuptial narrative. This is not going to be a story about starry-eyed bridesmaids and sentimental reminiscences. So far, so good. I like a bit of grit in a wedding story.
The novel is written from three points of view. Bride Adele has a voice of privilege tempered by a modicum of self-awareness. She has a secret, and it’s somehow tied up with why she is marrying Jason. Melanie Rhodes, Oliver’s still-grieving mother, describes herself as a ‘hunched-shouldered, greying, middle-aged object of pity’ who has vowed to ‘take retribution for what happened to [her] son.’ Heath portrays Melanie’s alcoholism with empathy, but there are aspects of Melanie’s character that don’t ring true for me. Also, the voices of Adele and Melanie are not sufficiently developed for the reader to be able to draw a clear distinction between the two. I found that I had to keep checking the chapter headings to work out who was speaking because Adele and Melanie are both written in the first person. The final voice is Sophie Rhodes, Oliver’s younger sister, and one of the more likeable characters. Sophie’s role is to slowly unravel the mystery of what happened on the fateful night of her brother’s death twelve years ago. Sophie’s perspective is narrated in the third person, which creates a somewhat jarring effect against the Adele and Melanie chapters. I would have found it more suspenseful to read only Adele or Melanie in the first person.
Jason, the groom, was Oliver’s best friend. He is presented as a slightly shady character, and the marriage between him and Adele does not appear to be based on mutual desire or even attraction. And someone out there is trying to stop them from getting married through a series of frightening events that are designed to disrupt the wedding. No one seems to want this wedding to happen – not even the bride, and the groom’s feelings are unclear. Jason’s character is not developed enough for me to understand or evaluate him. As the day of the wedding draws closer, Heath does inject enough suspense for the reader to keep turning pages to find out if this couple will actually tie the knot, but there are so many sub-plots and wranglings between the minor characters that when the final plot twist arrives, many of the smaller details are left unresolved or unexplained.
The pacing of the novel is erratic. Parts of it are very slow, and I have to confess to reaching a point where I didn’t care if Adele married Jason or not. Most of the characters are not the sort of people you would want to befriend or even meet. Some of the plot points are a little far-fetched and hard to believe. However, I did enjoy wondering if any of the narrators were reliable, and I did like the ending – even though it came somewhat abruptly after a very long wait.
The Wedding Party is a light weekend read that would appeal to young adults.
Publisher’s blurb
Three families united by a terrible event must survive a deadly wedding in this latest gripping thriller from INTERNATIONAL BESTSELLER Rebecca Heath, author of The Summer Party and The Dinner Party!
A group of old friends. A grieving mother. A lying bride.
Adele and Jason are childhood sweethearts. Their wedding day on the sunny Australian coast is a chance to reunite and celebrate with friends and family.
But Adele isn’t telling the truth about her relationship. And some of the wedding party – still reeling from a tragic death in the group a decade before – hold secrets of their own.
What happened on the jetty all those years ago was an accident, everyone agrees.
Or do they?