This started off promisingly. A guy who ‘lodges’ (ie; breaks in and lives) in luxury houses as a permanent lifestyle choice, thinks of himself as a caretaker, and does this very well in his opinion. It had to go wrong sooner or later right? And yes it does. Introducing three other ‘interlopers’ to the story and a murder of a house owner they weren’t expecting home. It trips along nicely in the first half and is quite amusing in places. Cringily so but amusing.

But then it grinds to a halt. The characters are just going around in circles. Lengthy, overly drawn out discussions ensue with them trying to work out what happened to cause the murder which happened right in front of them. No baddies appears for ages trying to get them, and quite frankly I lost interest. Skipping through the last section to roughly work out what happened, and it was predictable. Even the ending. Of course he got the girl. Of course they escaped jail. Even the perpetrator wasn’t a surprise at all. There, I’ve saved a whole heap of time for you.

A shame, as it had promise. Just too much padding and no shocking surprises.

Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for the ARC in exchange for my honest review.

A Beginner’s Guide to Breaking and Entering is a great read, easy to get into and full of interesting characters.

Al is an interloper - a person who breaks into people’s houses while they are away, stays there and then leaves before they come home. He’s never been caught before but this time he meets a group of 3 people at one of his regular haunts and they join up together, slightly against his better judgment.

What ensues is quite often funny, mysterious and full of drama, as the foursome end up suspects in a murder. Instead of going to ground, they decide to try and solve Davy’s murder.

While I did hugely enjoy reading this book, I have a few unanswered questions still. What is Al’s real name? Why is he an interloper? Did they stick together as a 4 in the end?

In my country we have a lot of Als, Ella's and others who somehow fell through the cracks of the housing market and trying to find a roof above their head. Part of this group is like Al - he is always very careful not to attract attention and he leaves the homes he temporarily lives spotlessly clean. Part of this group is completely different - they break in by vandalizing the home and leave it only after they completely wrecked it and the police had to come to get them out.
Of course, it's no fun to write a book about someone in the latter group! But this book about Al and his reluctant group of friends is very funny at times although slightly ridiculous.
Things go from good to wonderful and from bad to worse in a short period of time and at one point it looks like there will be no 'happy ending'. The fun thing is, that the whole story end very differently from what I thought it would, and it tied the whole story nicely up.
Not a spectacular tale, but engaging and entertaining with some good characters.

Thanks to Random House and Netgalley for this review copy.

3.5 stars rounded up.
Well this was all thing convoluted and interconnected with a healthy side order of, well, bonkers! But delightfully so...
We start with a Al, not his real name, who lives his life by staying in other peoples' houses. Mostly whilst they are away on holiday but he is also not adverse to making the most of an unoccupied second home, or property under probate. He is currently in prison, quite how he gets there, all will be revealed... Fast rewind to the beginning of how he got there, we find him escaping from a situation. A situation that will pretty much set up the run of bad luck he encounters during the rest of this book. After fleeing by the skin of his teeth from said situation, he decides to fall back on an old favourite property, only to find it already, shock horror, occupied... But... new "friends" and all that jazz, and so happens his second big mistake of the book, they all team up. But the house they then go to "visit" gives them more than they expected... it's not only occupied, but said occupant is then killed...
And so begins the aforementioned bonkers cat and mouse game which delivers some scary and funny escapades, skirting plausibility, but just managing to say on the right side of credible...
The plot is a little convoluted and occasionally went astray. That said, the characters did a good job of recapping every so often which was helpful, if a little annoying after a while. That said, I can forgive the repetition and then twisty turny path it all followed as, to be honest, it was quite a lot of fun.
I do have some reservations about Al's career choices. Some of the decisions he made along the way didn't really ring true with either his personality or what had come before. I also found the ending of the book to be quite weak in comparison with what had gone before. Which left me a little bit wanting rather than wholly satisfied. I also have questions...!
All in all, a solid read that did keep me entertained for the duration. For me though, not as strong as his previous books - The Sanctuary, and The Last Day - which I do recommend you read.
My thanks go to the Publisher and Netgalley for the chance to read this book.

Such a fun read - some great moments of humour in amongst the darker parts of the plot. A fresh original premise and a story told with a real flair and distinctive voice. One of my fave reads so far for 2024.

Al is a squatter who meets up with other squatters. He only stays in properties where the owners are away but gets caught out when an owner returns home. I did not like the characters and found the book slow and the plot rather repetitive. I do not believe in squatters behaving correctly either. Sadly not one for me. Thanks to NetGalley for ARC,

I haven't read any books by this author before and was intrigued by the premise of this one. It's very entertaining and flows along nicely with its disparate cast of "interlopers" caught up in a murder. I did find the plot got a bit overcomplicated, but on the whole it was a fun read.
Thank you to netgalley and Random House for an advance copy of this book.

I read this while on holiday and it did worry me a bit as although we have not had squatters, we have been burgled in the past. Perhaps not the best choice to read while we were away from home. That said, it was entertaining and I did feel that if Al stuck to his rules it was somewhat less traumatic than being burgled, although still disturbing. His arrogance did rather annoy me but surely the point of a good book is the illicit emotions , educate, inform or entertain.

So you find yourself in a predicament and you dig a hole to get yourself out of said predicament... but you don't learn and so keep repeating the process, for what felt like 1,000,000 times before fate eventually intervened and Al was finally caught. I'm honestly not sure how much was exactly true and how much was made up as most of the stuff you read seemed weird/stupid/daft to be true! Sadly not a book I'd recommend but I thank the publisher for allowing me to read it.

Al is a squatter who lives in people's houses while they are off on holidays. But not just any houses. High-end real estate. He doesn’t consider himself to be a squatter, but an unofficial house-sitter, and calls himself an interloper. He never steals anything and takes great care not to damage anything. Most people never know that Al has been in their homes. Al figures if the house will be sitting empty for a few weeks or even months, why not enjoy it? Al is good at what he does, he has strict methods, and ways in which he avoids getting caught, and always has a swift exit plan. But one little slip-up while interloping leads to a close encounter with a suddenly returning homeowner.

Needing a place to stay for the night, Al returns to one of his safe houses, where to his surprise he finds a trio of like-minded people already interloping in the property. All are initially suspicious of one another, however, they eventually team up and break into a house together. This break-in goes terribly wrong, ending up with a body and the group on the run with the police and an unknown killer after them. They need to find out who the killer is to try and get the police to believe they are not the murderers.

This book is written as a story told by Al, whose real name is not disclosed. Al is narrating the story and the situation that he and his new group of friends find themselves in. He has a funny defensive humour and makes light often to try and diffuse a situation. It is an unusual story, an unusual lifestyle, and at times a fun and enjoyable read. At other times I found myself disliking Al and his friends, who were constantly bemoaning their fate, all the while living a lifestyle of complete illegality with no regard for the fact that they were doing anything wrong. They were put out by the murder because it impacted how they lived. Not particularly upset that someone died.

There were some good moments, and the writing was well structured, with the pace overall on target. It was something a little different from the norm, but I found myself wanting to enjoy it more than I actually did. I enjoyed the humour, but the improbable Scooby gang premise just didn’t quite hit the mark for me. A light read, and I think if you can connect with the characters, you will enjoy it.

*I received this book from NetGalley for review, but all opinions are my own.

"When it comes to breaking into someone else's house, there are rules...If you're going to be an interloper, which is my term for my highly specific profession, you have to treat the property as it of was your own. If you manage that, more often than not the few people you encounter will genuinely believe you own it, provided they didn't see the rightful owner their last week..."

Professional squatter aka interloper world-weary 'Al' finds himself on the run and trying to solve a murder after working alongside a group of 'colleagues', sisters sparky Em and focused Elle and their eccebtric techie, Jonny. What follows is a witty, entertaining and quirky crime caper through England's prime properties and privileged people's lives and careers. The main characters weren't initially likeable, but did grow on me as we got to know them better and understood their motivations. I did find the financial element of the crime lost me a little and I felt the plot could have been more concise, but overall I enjoyed this somewhat farcical murder mystery, which reminded me of How To Kill Your Family.

A joy to read.
This book really was that. The author takes the important issue of occupying other peoples property vacant properties, oh and he throws in murder, but manages to do it all with a light approach, without belittling the seriousness of the issue..
The story is told in the first person, with a linear timeline which suited me as I find lots flask backs and forth a tiresome overworked mechanism.
The lead character refers to the occupations of properties as "interloping", and is most careful to leave no sign of his entry or his presence when he eventually leaves the properties prior to the owners return from the business trip, or holiday, or even to their second/holiday home.
I can't recommend it highly enough..

The story is told by Al, a squatter who only stays in peoples houses while they are away. He meets up with a team of 3 other squatters and they break into a house when the owner is in Dubai. Unfortunately he is at home. The book is slightly different and written with humour. Unfortunately I did not like the characters of Al or his friends as they were very arrogant about what they did, not accepting they were doing anything wrong. Sorry, this book wasn't for me.

You may call him a squatter but he would prefer interloper. You don't know his real name, But when he stumbles across others doing the same thing it all descends into murder and mayhem. Fun romp into a conspiracy, good pacing, characters and engaging style. Enjoyed it!

Al is an interloper. Someone who stays in wealthy homes while the owners are away. Everything is going well until he breaks into the wrong house and finds a body. Soon things go from bad to worse.

Although I have yet to read this author’s other books, I understand they are a slightly different style to what A Beginner’s Guide To Breaking And Entering is. I feel this reads as a cosy crime novel with plenty of humour running throughout. I enjoyed the narrator Al and his thoughts, as well as the peculiar situations he finds himself in. The other characters are also well written and add a lot of intrigue to the story. This is certainly an original, easy to read novel.

Although the overall story was entertaining, there were times where I felt the pacing slowed slightly and my interest started to wane. Saying that, this is definitely a usual story, in a good way, and offers a fun, quirky read with twists and turns. 3.5 stars rounded up. Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for this copy in return for an honest review.

Seriously brilliant! A really original premise and quirky and engaging storytelling. There’s lots to get to grips with, murders, money laundering, impressive tech savvy and of the moment malarkey and a cast of characters that put scooby doo and his friends to shame and of course there’s the interloping.
There are lots of twists and turns along the way and the plot kept me guessing to the end, which was an extra bonus, but I loved the ride regardless. One of the most entertaining and fascinating reads I’ve encountered in a while.
Definitely a writer to follow, can’t wait to read more from him.

A very modern and gripping novel, that I found myself thinking about when I wasn't reading it! I was desperate to know "whodunnit", and loved the twists and turns, I loved "Al" and his secret identity, and his "rules". Definitely will be recommending this book to people!

‘A beginners guide to breaking and entering’ is an intriguing book. I enjoyed the premise, and story with the main narrator ‘Al’ (not his real name of course) a seasoned ‘interloper’ (e.g squatter), gets involved with another group of interlopers and one thing leads to another and eventually murder.

For me the pacing was a little off, and in parts it really dragged on (to the point where I unusually stopped reading it for. Few weeks). The characters are well written, none of them particularly likeable and it is a nice little read.

3.5 rounded to 4 on here.

Thank you to netgalley and penguin random house for an arc

I loved the author's fun, engaging writing style. It's written in the first person and that person is very dry witted, very funny and very likeable. 'Al' is also an uninvited house sitter or "interloper" and so Al's not his real name obviously. He's someone who in his own words is being "collared for something he didn't do, but who absolutely deserves to be caught for all the things he did." He's someone who manages to antagonise both "the law and the criminals, and nearly get himself killed about six times." That said he's never hurt anyone physically as he doesn't "have the upper body strength for one thing". As well as being funny, there's a good murder mystery element and I absolutely loved the will-they-won't-they chemistry between Al and Em. The only thing that stopped this being a 5-star read was that for a fun, frenetic and slightly farcical murder mystery it veered slightly off track in the last part introducing lots of new plot points and bit characters and getting unnecessarily complicated.

I wasn't sure what to expect with this book. Its definitely not something I would normally pick up but I actually really enjoyed it. The main character 'Al' is extremely likable and very funny. Even though he is a criminal you want him to succeed in what he does and I could picture everything he was doing really easily.

You do have to concentrate while reading this book as lots of characters are introduced and it could become quite confusing if you arent paying attention.

All in all I really liked this book. Thank you netgalley for a free copy in exchange for an honest review.