Everyone in My Family Has Killed Someone

Everyone in My Family Has Killed Someone by Benjamin Stevenson is a comedic suspense novel of a family who assembles for a weekend getaway at a ski resort in Australia. Billed by the paternal aunt of the family as a “reunion,” the family anticipates the release from prison of Michael Cunningham, brother of the novel’s narrator. The novel blends tropes of the mystery genre with contemporary metafiction as its narrator explicitly draws attention to his role as the mystery’s detective. The title, in its playful, tongue-in-cheek tone, asserts the truth, with narrator Ernie revealing, as the novel unfolds, the deaths caused by each family member prior to the novel’s present day.

Benjamin Stevenson also performs as a standup comedian throughout his native Australia, and his books have been published in the United States and United Kingdom. He is the author of three novels and a novella. Stevenson’s debut novel Greenlight was shortlisted for the 2019 Ned Kelly Award for Best First Fiction. He was shortlisted for the International Thriller Writers Award for Best Original Paperback for Either Side of Midnight. HBO purchased the rights for a limited television series based on Everyone in My Family Has Killed Someone.

This guide refers to the 2022 hardcover edition by Mariner Books.

Content Warning: This guide references violence and death by suicide.

Plot Summary

Ernest “Ernie” Cunningham wakes one night to a telephone call from his brother, Michael, who requests his help. He has hit a man with his car and, after discovering that the man had been shot, placed him in his car. Ernie helps dig a hole to bury the man, though they debate whether he is truly dead or not. After the hole is dug, Michael leaves to retrieve the body, and Ernie watches from afar. Upon his return, Michael insists the man is now certainly dead. Michael drives Ernie home, and they speak of the duffle bag containing nearly $300,000 in the back of the car. Much later, Ernie informs police of the location of the body and Michael’s involvement. Ernie is called to testify against Michael at his trial, and Michael is sentenced to a three-year prison term.

The plot shifts to the present day. Ernie is joining his family at a winter ski resort to reunite with Michael upon his release from prison. The family convenes on the day before Michael’s release. Ernie provides an overview of each of the family members, noting that each one, as the novel’s title indicates, has caused a death. Important details of the backstory are woven in, explaining that the Cunningham name is notorious among police. This began with Ernie’s father, Robert, who shot and killed a police officer during a robbery. As the plot unfolds, however, Ernie will uncover the truth about his father’s death, including his involvement as a police informant for a criminal ring that obtained money by kidnapping the children of wealthy families then demanding large ransoms.

Ernie and the others anxiously await Michael’s arrival. Ernie still has in his possession the bag of money from Michael’s car on the night they buried the body of the man, named Alan Holton. He has spent a bit of the money but plans to return the rest to Michael. The next morning as the family awakens at the resort, however, the body of an unknown man is discovered outside. Initially, the man is assumed to have died by frostbite, but Ernie’s stepsister, Sofia Garcia-Cunningham, notices that he bears the signs of suffocation by ash—the method of choice of the perpetrator in a recent string of deaths, who has been nicknamed “the Black Tongue Killer.” Later that day, Michael arrives in a large box truck, along with Erin Cunningham, Ernie’s estranged wife who has since become romantically involved with Michael. The truck raises suspicions for Ernie, but Michael shrugs it off as a mix-up with the car rental agency. Ernie is relieved when Michael greets him warmly, but Michael is quickly accused by the police officer investigating the death of the mystery body (since dubbed “Green Boots” in homage to the unknown body on Mount Everest) of being responsible for the death. Most of the Cunninghams are outraged and adamant that, having only been released from prison that morning, it would have been impossible for Michael to kill the man. Yet Michael complies, agreeing to wait in a locked room. His stepfather, attorney Marcelo Garcia, who defended Michael in his criminal trial, demands to meet with Michael in private, but Michael insists he does not want Marcelo’s help and instead asks to speak only with Ernie. Ernie meets with Michael in the locked room and learns that Michael was actually released from prison a day earlier than he had told the family. Michael instructs Ernie to look in the back of the rental truck—there he will find something that explains the unknown details still remaining about Michael’s involvement with Alan Holton and Holton’s connection to their late father.

With some difficulty, Ernie manages to enter the back of the truck alone. He discovers a casket that contains the remains of the police officer whom his father killed. However, along with the remains is the skeleton of what was clearly a child’s body. Ernie is determined, then, to untangle the identity of Green Boots, the identity of the man’s killer, and the killer’s motive. He suspects—as the other family members have begun to—that this death does somehow connect to Michael. Ernie sets out to uncover this connection and learn the truth of the circumstances surrounding his father’s death and Michael’s apparent involvement. Before Ernie can question Michael, however, Michael is found dead. The cause of death appears identical to that of Green Boots: suffocation by ashes.

As the plot unfolds, Ernie discovers the secrets carried by many family members about the alleged “murders” they have carried out. He also directly addresses the reader throughout, noting that he is adhering to the “rules” of the mystery genre. A snowstorm traps the family at the resort, heightening the tension but also creating complications to the novel’s conflict. By the close of the novel, two additional characters die at the resort, but Ernie successfully solves the mystery. The Black Tongue Killer is, in fact, his long-lost brother, who the family had presumed dead; the killer committed the series of murders out of his eagerness to be accepted as a “true” Cunningham. On being revealed, the killer sets the lodge ablaze and is only barely defeated by the family, with Ernie present to observe his final breath.