Husband and Wife by K.L. Slater review: Not your usual suspects

When it comes to murder mysteries, K.L. Slater is a great author to follow. Her recent novel, Husband and Wife, is available as an Audible Original, and it’s more than worth the purchase.

It’s not your typical K.L. Slater story. While there is a murder to solve, there are a lot of other pieces of puzzles to put together. One of the storylines came out of left field and didn’t really fit with the rest of the story, but for the most part, the book flowed well and the storytelling was on point.

This is another one of those stories where there are twists just as you think you’ve solved the mystery. Don’t go in assuming it’s one person, because you’ll quickly realize you’re wrong.

What is Husband and Wife by K.L. Slater about?

The novel is mostly told via the viewpoint of Nicola, despite the blurb of the book making it look like Parker and Luna are the ones telling the story. Yes, the two of them do share their viewpoints, especially as we take looks back at the past, but it’s Nicola who is trying to put the pieces of the puzzle together.

When she finds out that her son and daughter-in-law were involved in a car accident, Nicola goes on a mission to figure out what happened. At their house, she learns that they are selling and had no idea about it. Then she finds a scarf that looks like the one belonging to a murdered girl.

Now Nicola needs to figure out what’s going on. Did her son kill someone? Was it Luna? Why are they sleeping in separate bedrooms? There is so much to unpack from start to finish.

Husband and Wife book review

I’ll admit that I didn’t expect to get this story told from Parker’s mother’s point of view based on the blurb. I didn’t mind it, but it’s just not what I was expecting.

I did appreciate the various timelines and the jumps between characters. We even got to hear from the murdered character to find out what she was actually up to so that she could earn money. Just as you think you’ve solved her murder, there’s another twist thrown in, so that kept me on my toes.

One storyline that involved Luna’s mother didn’t seem to make a lot of sense or really matter to the overall storyline. I didn’t really get why it was thrown in there since it didn’t do much to explain Luna at all. We didn’t get to know her mom enough to really care about her relationship with Luna.

The writing did keep me guessing until the end. There were moments that felt like they wrapped up a little too neatly at the end, but I appreciate that Slater had to wrap things up as best as possible. There is a hint that not everyone is getting away with what they did.

As much as the twists kept me gripped, I didn’t really connect to Luna or Parker enough to really care about them. The blurb was so focused on them that I expected more. I was rooting for Nicola to get to the bottom of it all, though. I also didn’t care for the extra plotline with Luna’s mother, so it does knock off some stars.

The twists on who killed the murdered woman, why, and who was being blackmailed were great, though. That part of the story certainly got realistically messy.

Stars: 4 out of 5

Husband and Wife by K.L. Slater is available to buy on Amazon.