I'm afraid to say that The Newcomer and I did not get on at all. I was fully ready to embrace a fast-paced crime mystery/thriller set in a far-flung location where a newcomer interacts with the locals (think Scrublands) and thought this would be the perfect book to read during the heatwave we've been having.

Instead this tested my patience as reader. There was so much dialogue which did not further the plot, and which - while the subject matter differed - felt like the protagonist was having the exact same conversation with everyone she came across. Paulina (said protagonist) is portrayed as some wild party girl who drinks too much and is constantly in some sort of state of rebelling against her mother. Aged 28, she relocates from Sydney to a remote Pacific island with the hope of finding a job and settling down there, and much of the first third of the book is her meeting various locals and clashing with them due to her ~wild party girl/irreverent personality~. Everyone who meets her is shocked by her, and she ingratiates her way into their lives (with what read to me like ulterior motives). While the novel reads relatively quickly it ended up feeling really quite repetitive.

This brings me to my next gripe with The Newcomer: Flawed and complex protagonists have their place in novels but Paulina is, honestly, insufferable, and I found her borderline unbearable to read about. Now, I think this is the point on the author's part but it elicited so much eye rolling from my end I couldn't look past it and it impacted upon my enjoyment of the novel.

The sections with Paulina's mother, Judy Novak, were more enjoyable and were well-written, but I'm sorry to say that this was not the book for me.

Coming to my rating : out of 5 stars
Cover : ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Title : ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Plot : ⭐️⭐️⭐️
Writing quality : ⭐️⭐️
Character development : ⭐️⭐️
Overall rating : ⭐️⭐️
Thanks for this ARC, but I was not able to connect to the characters and the plot, and so is my rating low. But maybe others enjoy this book, my rating is purely based on my emotions.

Set on a tiny Australian island in the South Pacific ocean, this is a thriller based on the death of a hard drinking, party girl called Paulina. Paulina, who is just turning 30, has swapped a boring office job in Sydney for island life. Based on Norfolk Island, the island she now calls home is known for its pine trees, sandy beaches and jagged cliffs. Paulina has a serious drink problem and also a tendency to meet the very worst types of men, cue the stereotypes! She picks up occasional work in the local restaurant and store. When she is found bludgeoned to death, every man on the island becomes a potential suspect. Paulina, despite being the victim, is the central character in this novel about her own murder. The narrative switches from Paulina before she died, to that of her mother, Judy, who is determined to find out who murdered her daughter.

I really, really did not like this book. There was nothing appealing about any of the characters. Paulina was very two dimensional and lacked both empathy and depth. I’m not a prude but I found the language was gratuitously coarse and vulgar. The book was about 100 pages too long and I found large chunks repetitive. There was a lot of banter between Paulina and her friends that offered very little by way of plot development. It was all very grim and very slooooow with zero suspense. I love a good thriller that keeps the reader hooked, but unfortunately this is not one of them. I got bored ¾ of the way through and sped-read to the end. This book may appeal to many, but not to me. I wish the author well with her publication.

Many thanks to @netgalley and @scribe_uk for this ebook in return for my honest opinion