Reviews with content warning for Death of parent - The Last Party

Reviews tagging 'Death of parent'

The Last Party by Clare Mackintosh

22 reviews

siobhanward's review against another edition

mysterious slow-paced

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

2.0

This book took a really long time to pick up and the ending didn't make up for the slog that was the first 75%. The plot was solid in premise, but just wasn't executed well. Too much was going on, there were too many characters and time jumps and I found that information was revealed and I had no idea why it was relevant because things were so convoluted. Ffion was a solid character (although like many books in this genre, she is way too close to the action and should definitely not be on the case), but her story got muddled with so many others' that it was hard to care about anyone. Unfortunately, despite liking Ffion, I can't say I'll be rushing to read any other books in this series.

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victoria_catherine_shaw's review

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adventurous dark mysterious medium-paced

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

3.0

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hmstumfoll's review against another edition

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dark emotional mysterious sad tense medium-paced

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

4.0

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bookishchaos's review

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dark emotional mysterious sad tense medium-paced

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

4.5

It was a little slow in the beginning but speeds up in the middle. There's a lot of characters to remember but overall this was really good. I was NOT expecting the plot twist.

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caprichosbooks's review

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adventurous dark emotional hopeful mysterious medium-paced

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

5.0

This book has everything. Excellent mystery that just keeps turning, adventure, and even a little romance.

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yvo_about_books's review against another edition

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2.5

Finished reading: July 30th 2023

"One missing man. One body in the lake. We hardly need Miss Marple, do we?"

It's true that I've had mixed reactions to Clare Mackintosh's writing so far, but I absolutely loved my time with Hostage and I was hoping for a repeat experience with The Last Party. I was intrigued by the premise with the party, the lake setting and a murder mystery... And I fully expected to have a great time reading this first book of a new series. Unfortunately I ended up struggling considerably instead. I still like the premise and the setting is without doubt very well described. This story had so much potential, but in the end it just all fell flat for me. What didn't work then? First of all, The Last Party was both way too slow for me and also way overlong. This story could have been easily at least 100 pages shorter, and the plot would have been a lot tigher this way. As it is, there are way too many different characters/POVs and way too many descriptions along the way, and this made the story drag considerably. Add the fact that every single character is unlikeable and only becomes worse once you get to know them better, and I honestly couldn't care less what happened to any of them. The whole mystery around who killed Rhys didn't seem present at all; instead the focus was on just how many characters were hiding something. It was just overkill; so many characters cheating on each other, so many horrible secrets, so many 'revelations' stacked up that you just become immune to them all. This is without doubt my least favorite Clare Mackintosh book so far, and I will definitely not be continuing this series.

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