The Sun Down Motel by Simone St. James Genres: Contemporary Fiction, Crime, Fiction, Mystery, Mystery Thriller, Supernatural
Published by Berkley on February 17, 2020
Format: Hardcover
Pages: 327
The secrets lurking in a rundown roadside motel ensnare a young woman, just as they did her aunt thirty-five years before, in this new atmospheric suspense novel from the national bestselling and award-winning author of The Broken Girls.
Upstate NY, 1982. Every small town like Fell, New York, has a place like the Sun Down Motel. Some customers are from out of town, passing through on their way to someplace better. Some are locals, trying to hide their secrets. Viv Delaney works as the night clerk to pay for her move to New York City. But something isn't right at the Sun Down, and before long she's determined to uncover all of the secrets hidden…
It would’ve been nice to end 2023 on a high note with my last read for 2023, but unfortunately it was not meant to be with The Sun Down Motel. At a first glance and for the majority of the book, there was nothing inherently wrong with the story. A murder mystery told via a split narrative perspective switching between Viv Delaney in 1982 and her niece Carley Kirk in 2017. Feeling listless after the recent death of her mother, she goes on a spur of the moment trip to Fell, New York. Looking into the great family mystery, Carley retraces Viv’s movements 35 years later in an effort to uncover what led to Viv’s sudden disappearance. Carley finds herself eventually working the night shift at the rundown and empty Sun Down Motel, the same job Viv occupied and happens upon some rather unusual and supernatural entities. Sounds interesting right? Unfortunately, the execution and contents are better suited and were probably written for a Book Club type of genre read.
On the plus side, the Sun Down Motel itself (as in the actual building) is described well and is a great setting. I don’t know why the book cover design for the motel and sign do not match the description in the book; it’s really not even close, the motel is described to be L-shaped with two floors, a wraparound walkway with stairs, and a sign saying “Vacancy, Cable TV!” not “no vacancy” in a middle of nowhere on an open stretch of highway. Come on jacket designer, you could’ve at least photographed a two-story building instead of a one-story block in the middle of a manicured residential block. The town of Fell, despite not being utilized or explored much, is also a compelling location to match the plot of the book.
Speaking of the plot, the synopsis sounds compelling but the greatest flaw with the Sun Down Motel is my general disinterest with the narrative and story. Despite the split perspective narrative, the overall mystery moves incredibly slow with little to keep your attention. For a book described as “deliciously creepy, spooky, and unsettling”, there is a lack of actual spooky content. There are ghosts included in the story, but they feel like an afterthought. There’s absolutely no lore or reason for why the ghosts exist at the Sun Down Motel to begin with, why they do what they do, and have almost no impact to the story (in particular the young boy and smoking man, they have nothing in common to the mystery). Perhaps I’m accustomed to books with more backstory development, but ghosts simply existing to add horror comes off as anything but spooky.
The other issue I have with the Sun Down Motel is while the concept sounds promising, many elements feel underused. The split perspective and time narrative is nothing new but its use here fees like a missed opportunity. Recent books I’ve read such as All Good People Here and Home Before Dark show how to use dual perspectives in a way that enhances and compliments each other by providing context clues to the reader. Unfortunately, The Sun Down Motel lacks the same finesse where details in Viv’s past perspective only give clues to Carley in the present instead of a back and forth exchange. Viv’s story also provides good insight into her mental state and psyche leading up to her disappearance, but it stands in stark contact to Carley’s story which is all investigation no atmosphere or action (though I did prefer Carley’s story for reasons I will get into). The reader is given clues to the mystery in 1972 but due to clunky execution, you end up having to read about Carley discovering the same clue verbatim in a less exciting manner which gets repetitive fast.
While the plot mostly makes sense, it slowly starts to lose control of the narrative as it approaches the conclusion. Once Viv’s disappearance is explained and the murders of 1970’s-1980’s are explored, character logic becomes flawed and suspect. While I found the core mystery to be decent if not predictable, I was really let down by the reveal of the culprit. The reveal itself was fine but the motivation behind the actions felt lackluster and poorly developed. View Spoiler » That is one of the worst reasons for committing a murder and anyone who has done any reading into criminal psychology can attest to that. That reasoning might work for grand larceny, arson, or other types of crime, but I found that to be incredibly weak for a murder. A character who is connected to the killer in 2017 (bc of course there has to be a connection to add danger for Carley in the present) also randomly decides to exact revenge(?) or justice(?) on Carley for reasons what are never explained (history of being unstable?). View Spoiler »
I found the character writing to be passable and inoffensive but lacking in depth. I personally did not care for Viv who suffered from the amateur detective trope of “I know I’m right but everyone else doesn’t believe me and I can’t prove anything!”. Her growing frustration at the situation and murder mystery correlated with my growing frustration as a reader as I slowly lost patience with her ridiculous antics and attempts at investigations that leapfrog over the line of what’s plausible and what’s fictional bologna. Despite being billed as two separate narratives that are meant to purposely echo each other, Viv and Carley started blending as characters for me despite their distinctive backgrounds and personalities. Side characters are slightly better with Alma, the sole policewoman working in Fell in the 1980’s and Marnie the freelance photographer. Both have interesting personalities and character motivations and the changes they show between 1982 and 2017 were a highlight.
Balancing them out unfortunately are Jamie and Nick. A pot-dealer doing deals at the motel in 1982 and a young man with a haunted past and an extended motel stay in 2017, both ultimately feel like they exist solely as possible romantic interests and nothing else (they are obviously described as being handsome and attractive at first sight). Although Nick is given more screentime and dialogue, he ultimately contributes almost nothing to the narrative and what little he contributes could’ve easily been given or combined with Carley’s roommate Heather. His haunted backstory also feels contrived and thrown-in to give him a bad boy dangerous vibe that has no relevance to the mystery and is never brought up again after.
Ultimately, I don’t think the Sun Down Motel is necessarily a bad book; it’s writing is fine and the plot is mostly decent if you can look past the drop in character logic at the end. I can see this being a predictable and easy read for a Book Club looking to read something slightly spooky without going too dark or twisted (I hate to stereotype but this book screams written for young/middle-aged women). For me though who prefers intense and hardcore mystery investigations (or strong supernatural themes), it was mostly slow and left a pretty disappointing aftertaste on its conclusion. On to 2024!