The Perfect Hosts by Heather Gudenkauf

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About The Book 📚

Title: The Perfect Hosts

Author: Heather Gudenkauf

Publication Date: November 4, 2025

Publisher: Park Row/Harlequin Trade Publishing

Genre: Adult, Detective & Mystery

Pages: 320

Setting: Wyoming

Click Here for Content Warnings (may contain spoilers)

Three Words That Describe This Book: dramatic, secrets, lies

Book Blurb: “Is it a boy or a girl? They would die to know…

Madeline and Wes Drake have invited two hundred of their closest friends and family to their sprawling horse ranch for the most anticipated event of the year: a “pistols and pearls” gender reveal party so sensational it is sure to make headlines. But the party descends into chaos when the celebratory explosive misfires, leaving one woman dead and a trail of secrets.

As the aftershocks of the bloody party ripple across the small town, Agent Jamie Saldano is brought on the scene to investigate. Battling his own demons from the past, Saldano unearths a web of deceit spun around the Drakes. The appearance of some unexpected houseguests only deepens the mystery. And as tensions mount, it becomes clear that the explosion wasn’t just an unlucky accident. But who was the target, and why? As the shadow of a killer looms, the happy parents-to-be must unravel the truth before it’s too late.”

About The Author

“Heather Gudenkauf is the Edgar Award nominated, New York Times & USA Today bestselling author of ten novels, including The Overnight Guest and her most recent thriller Everyone is Watching. Her debut novel, The Weight of Silence, was an instant NYT bestseller and remained on the list for 22 weeks. Gudenkauf’s critically acclaimed novels have been published in over 25 countries and have sold over 2.5 million copies worldwide. Her books have been featured on many Best Of roundups including lists by The New York Times, The Washington Post, NPR, Amazon, Apple Books, GoodReads, and more. Her eleventh novel, The Perfect Hosts will be released on November 4, 2025.

Heather was born in Wagner, South Dakota, the youngest of six children. At one month of age, her family returned to the Rosebud Indian Reservation in South Dakota where her father was employed as a guidance counselor and her mother as a school nurse. At the age of three, her family moved to Iowa, where she grew up. Having been born with a profound unilateral hearing loss (there were many evenings when Heather and her father made a trip to the bus barn to look around the school bus for her hearing aids that she often conveniently would forget on the seat beside her). Heather tended to use books as a retreat, would climb into the toy box that her father’s students from Rosebud made for the family with a pillow, blanket, and flashlight, close the lid, and escape the world around her. Heather became a voracious reader and the seed of becoming a writer was planted.

Heather lives in Iowa with her family and a very spoiled German Shorthaired Pointer named Lolo. In her free time, Heather enjoys spending time with her family, reading, swimming, and hiking. She is currently working on her next novel.” https://heathergudenkauf.com/#biography

Other Books by This Author

The Overnight Guest
The Weight of Silence
These Things Hidden
Everyone is Watching
This is How I Lied

My Review

› After enjoying This is How I Lied by Heather Gudenkauf, I was excited to receive a digital Netgalley arc for her newest mystery novel called The Perfect Hosts. I have to admit, the pink and blue cake on the cover caught my attention for sure.

› First Line: “Madeline Drake looks out her bedroom window, one hand resting on her belly, one hand shielding her eyes. The hard disk of sun sits like a crown atop what Wes calls their own personal stretch of the Tetons.”

› The Perfect Hosts begins with Madeline Drake and her husband, Wes, throwing a huge gender reveal party (it’s actually a sex reveal party as they are revealing the sex of the baby, not the gender) when an unexpected explosion causes death and chaos. Madeline and Drake survive, but are part of the investigation by ATF agent Jamie Saldano. Jamie’s sister went missing in this small town (17 years ago, I think), and he’s returned to try and find out what happened to her. His marriage is also in a rough patch because his wife hasn’t been able to find a job in her field. Madeline’s stepsister, Lucy, has also returned, and we aren’t quite sure what she wants. Mellie claims to be just a waitress at the party who has nowhere to go after the explosion, but we know she has a connection to Wes, and she’s determined to get what she wants.

“I have to say, you’ve really outdone yourselves. I mean, a rodeo? Reba? You two are the perfect hosts, now, aren’t you?”

Who’s behind the deadly explosion? What do Lucy and Mellie want? What happened to Juneau?

› Told from multiple perspectives, The Perfect Hosts is what I call “popcorn mystery drama”. It’s marketed as a Mystery Thriller, which set me up for disappointment because I didn’t find it “thrilling”. The characters needed more development, and the story needed more description. However, it has high readability, and the multiple points of view make it interesting. It would be a good book for a flight or a trip. The beginning pulled me in with immediate action; however, I was bored the rest of the time, and the ending was rushed. I didn’t find the message unique, and guessed who did it within the first couple of chapters. I found myself hoping my guess was wrong, so when I found out I was right, it made the ending anticlimactic. There is some repetition of things the reader has already learned, and some of the character decisions didn’t make sense. Overall, it was an okay read for me. Don’t take my word for it, though, because 73% of the early reviewers on Goodreads have given The Perfect Hosts 4 or 5 stars.

APPEAL FACTORS
Storyline: plot & character-driven, open-ended
Pace: medium
Tone: angsty, high-drama, moody, bleak, menacing, violent
Writing Style: conversational
Character: flawed, sarcastic, unlikeable, multiple points of view
Disability representation: none
LGBTQIA+ Representation: none
Racial Representation: none

Read Alikes:
The House Across the Lake by Riley Sager (secrets & lies)
The Other Mrs by Mary Kubica (marriage, secrets, & lies)
The Block Party by Jamie Day (party gone wrong)

› In the past, I have given a rating out of ten and converted that to a star rating, but I’m no longer giving a star rating here on my blog. I will continue to do that on Goodreads and The Story Graph.

› Final Thoughts
• I’ve seen some reviewers recommend The Perfect Hosts to fans of Yellowstone, but that comparison didn’t work out for me. I think I can recommend this book to fans of dramatic mysteries who are looking for a quick and easy read. This book was a miss for me, but I’m still looking forward to checking out more by Gudenkauf.