Carole´s Monday: The 7 deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle

Author: Stuart Turton

Narrator: James Cameron Stewart

Title: The 7 1/2 Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle

Genre: Mystery, Thriller, Fantasy, & Historical Fiction

Format: Audiobook

Published: February 8, 2018

Where I got It: Audible

Summary: 

Aiden Bishop knows the rules. Evelyn Hardcastle will die every day until he can identify her killer and break the cycle. But every time the day begins again, Aiden wakes up in the body of a different guest at Blackheath Manor. And some of his hosts are more helpful than others. With a locked-room mystery that Agatha Christie would envy, Stuart Turton unfurls a breakneck novel of intrigue and suspense.

Review:

Gotta love book club. I had my eye on this one but never gave it a chance until this was picked to read in my book club.

Here we follow Aiden who knows the rules to the game. Evelyn Hardcastle will die every day until he can figure out who the killer will be and break the cycle. He wakes up in the body of a different guest at Blackheath Manor. He has 8 hosts to try to solve it or the loop begins again and his memories are wiped clean. 

What a cool concept. Mixture of Agatha Christie-esque mystery and 'Groundhog Day'. So cool and def a great book to spark conversation. 

Now...I will say I struggled hardcore at the beginning. It was slow and slightly confusing. WHICH you are supposed to be confused-ish. This is Aiden's narrative. You only know as much as he knows. Very, very slow to get the story off the ground. I do think some parts could have been trimmed down a wee bit. 

Once you get past the first couple of chapters things start speeding up and you can see that there is more to the story and characters. Aiden has a mountain to climb for sure. I don't want to give away any spoilers.....but he has a full plate and not everything is as it seems. 

I go back and forth about Anna. Not sure what I would do in Aiden's place. A part of me would want to save her too, BUUUUUUUT after a big reveal....mmmm. 

The ending was good. Def has a slight open-ended feel to it which I liked. 

OOOO and that one BIG, BIG twist???? Oof. That got me good. I didn't see it coming. There were a lot of twists that tied in but it was so good. 

The narrator was okay. The voice is familiar but I can't remember where I had heard it before. The female voices were subpar. They all sounded alike (minus the old lady who was more distinct). The guy voices were good. 

This was a tough review to write ;) I didn't want to give anything away. 

But yes, pretty good especially for a book club. I can't wait to discuss this with the gals! 

Lots of mystery. A slowwwww beginning and some parts could've been slimmed down a wee bit, but once you get into the thick of things you won't want to stop until you figure out what the heck is going on. I enjoyed this. 4 stars. 

Challenge(s):
- #12 for Audiobook challenge