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  • Published: 10 April 2025
  • ISBN: 9781804952962
  • Imprint: Penguin
  • Format: Audio Download
  • RRP: $34.99
Categories:

This Is Not a Game

  • Kelly Mullen




Gilmore Girls meets Knives Out. A deliciously smart locked-room mystery featuring an irresistible grandmother and granddaughter sleuthing duo.

Two unlikely sleuths. A killer cocktail of suspects.

A Gibson garnished with three silverskin onions is 77-year-old Mimi's favourite cocktail. It is best served with a crossword puzzle, not as an apéritif, at Jane Ireland's extravagant auction party.

But given Mimi has been blackmailed into attending Jane's event, at a grand old mansion in Mackinac Island (Michigan’s answer to The Hamptons), there are worse drinks she could spend an evening sinking.

Thankfully for Mimi, she's roped her unassuming granddaughter, Addie, into accompanying her. While Addie spots celebrities and socialites in the manor's labyrinth of dark rooms, and Mimi wonders how to confess the real reason for her presence at the soiree, a scream pierces the air.

Jane is dead.

And when a second body turns up, Mimi and Addie soon become the unlikeliest of sleuths in a race to narrow down the suspects.

In a house that contains as many secrets as the people within it, it’s going to take more than a Gibson to survive the night…

  • Published: 10 April 2025
  • ISBN: 9781804952962
  • Imprint: Penguin
  • Format: Audio Download
  • RRP: $34.99
Categories:

Praise for This Is Not a Game

Slick and witty

Daily Mail

Mullen debuts with an impressive closed-circle whodunit

Publishers Weekly

A thriller novel with a difference

Cosmopolitan

Fabulous, over-the-top fun

The Guardian

Locked room murder mystery at its best

The i Paper

Thrilling and heartwarming... This Is Not a Game is a playful mix of classic whodunnit and modern wit stirred to perfection

Criminal Element

Despite the title, this is absolutely a game from the first word to the last

Kirkus

A fun, atmospheric debut with sharp humour and classic whodunnit charm

Dead Good Books

A quirky variation on Golden Age locked room mysteries with a modern zest of eccentricity and humour, US author Kelly Mullen’s debut is very much a crowd pleaser in the mould of the KNIVES OUT movie series

Crime Time

A grand finale reveal Poirot would be proud of

Woman & Home
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