Reviews

The Last Murder at the End of the World: The Dazzling New High Concept Murder Mystery from the Author of the Million Copy Selling, the Seven Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle by Stuart Turton

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cwill89's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging mysterious tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

mamaquiereleer's review against another edition

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adventurous mysterious tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.75

slock5's review against another edition

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adventurous mysterious tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.75

The more I think about this book the more frustrated I get. It’s got an intriguing premise for a murder mystery and I really wanted to like it but the execution just fell flat for me. There might be some spoilers ahead so read with caution.
I didn’t love being in the POV of the AI(kind of??) being who just exists in everyone’s head. It felt unnecessary and just not a great choice for the story. If we’re going to be switching between characters for chapters why not just be in those different characters POV’s. Maybe there’s a deeper meaning to it that went over my head but it just bothered me.
How big is this island? They keep bringing things up about different parts of the island and it just feels like it’s too large for what they actually try to say. Like at one point the characters hear a wolf howling in the distance. There is a map in this book, where the hell on it is a wolf pack living? Not to mention how they got on the island to begin with.
The whole mist thing rubs me the wrong way as well. How does the mist kill everything including sea creatures? Maybe I don’t get the science that well, but I don’t think mist typically can exist underwater… yet there are multiple mentions of sharks/fish getting too close to it and dying. I just don’t buy it.
I don’t love the explanation for the memory wipe at the end.

the fact that everyone’s memory got wiped for the sake of deterring just Hephaestus until him and Thea died in the fog?? Did every single person’s memory really need to be wiped for that?

the memory thing kind of fits back into being for Abi’s POV throughout the book as well. We are literally in the head of the being who knows exactly what happened that night. She doesn’t need to solve the murder because she already knows. So why be in her POV??? Also the facts that she deemed she was allowed to share vs not share with the characters seemed arbitrary. I think I would not have been annoyed with it nearly as much if we hadn’t known that Abi literally knows everything.

I suppose the reveal at the end that Abi couldn’t/wouldn’t actually stop the mist balances it out slightly. But they put so much emphasis on “you’ve gotta figure it out and get a confession to save us all.” Why make it so overly complicated? Why not just tell Emory that the mist won’t kill the villagers and that Niema wants them to inherit the earth.

I can somewhat appreciate the mystery and the twists throughout, but it feels like the final answer to the who dunnit kind of falls flat. I suppose it’s the most optimistic outlook but, for everything that happened to build up to it, I was expecting more I suppose. It also felt like there was just too much happening. Maybe that was caused by the pseudo multiple POV’s but it was almost too much to balance and keep in my head.
I guess overall I think I liked this book more than I disliked it, but there just felt like a bunch of little decisions that were made plot wise that didn’t work for me.

abbylriley's review against another edition

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hopeful mysterious tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

While I think the world-building was a little too weighty and could have benefitted from more pages (it’s honestly too short for the height of the concept), this was an incredibly original read and as a over of science fiction, I had a great time with it.