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kelly_e 's review for:
The Night We Lost Him
by Laura Dave
lighthearted
mysterious
relaxing
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
No
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Title: The Night We Lost Him
Author: Laura Dave
Genre: Mystery
Rating: 3.50
Pub Date: September 17, 2024
I received a complimentary eARC from Simon & Schuster Canada via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own. #Gifted
T H R E E • W O R D S
Introspective • Thoughtful • Leisurely
📖 S Y N O P S I S
When the patriarch of a famed hotel empire dies under suspicious circumstances, his daughter and her estranged brother join forces to find out what happened, unraveling a larger mystery about who their father really was.
Liam Noone was many things to many people. To the public, he was an exacting, self-made hotel magnate fleeing his past. To his three ex-wives, he was a loving albeit distant family man who kept his finances flush and his families carefully separated. To Nora, he was a father who often loved her from afar—notably, a cliffside cottage perched on the California coast where he fell to his death.
The authorities rule the death accidental, but Nora and her estranged brother Sam have other ideas. As Nora and Sam form an uneasy alliance to unravel the mystery, they start putting together the pieces of their father’s past and uncover a family secret that changes everything.
💭 T H O U G H T S
I'd previously read Laura Dave's The Last Thing He Told Me, which I enjoyed, so it was easy to add The Night We Lost Him to my 2024 anticipated releases list. Honestly, I thought the synopsis for this one sounded more intriguing and more along my reading tastes than her previous novel. Unfortunately, it ended up falling a little flat.
Swapping between the present day where Sam and Nora are trying to piece together what really happened and flashbacks to Liam's past, this story felt like a very low stakes mystery. The plot slowly reveals Liam's long held secret. The strength for me was really in how it paints a picture of the life a parent has lived before a child came to know them. There was so much potential to develop that aspect, yet it isn't flushed out to its full capacity.
The writing is engaging and well constructed. As for the characters, they weren't very likeable and they're development felt surface level. In fact, I didn't feel as though I got to know they well enough to ever become fully invested. I continually questioning their motivations and decisions, and maybe that was the point, yet it had the opposite effect for me.
The Night We Lost Him is one of those books I enjoyed reading at the time, yet it didn't wow me. It's a family saga with an underlying love story wrapped up in a mystery. What I really liked is how it asks the question 'how well can we really know the people we love?' Despite this, I felt it kept me at a distance throughout the entire narrative. If you're looking for a page-turning thriller, this isn't it. But if you enjoy slower paced mysteries motivated by grief this will be more your thing.
📚 R E A D • I F • Y O U • L I K E
• family mysteries
• sibling relationships
• short chapters
⚠️ CW: death, death of parent, grief, murder, infidelity, injury/injury detail, medical content, cursing, alcohol, suicidal thoughts, estranged siblings
🔖 F A V O U R I T E • Q U O T E S
"When you lost too much in quick succession, it feels unimageable to risk losing anything else."
"And when you are grieving, guilt lives inside your sadness, doesn’t it? The guilt lives there like an unfortunate side effect of what you haven’t done. You haven’t saved who matters most."
"We can love someone and they love someone else. We can spend a lifetime trying to understand them, without accepting they weren't really ours to understand. We can look someone straight in the eye and never bear witness to the most private part of them - the part they saved just for themselves."
"Pieces help. They help to make you whole. They strip away the shock. They strip it away until, slowly but surely, the shock isn't your entire story. Even when the thing you truly want - the thing my brother and I both still want - is the thing we can't have anymore. Our father standing here, with his mysteries intact. Closer, and farther, at the same time."
"He'll still be the person I recognize before I even know who I see."
Author: Laura Dave
Genre: Mystery
Rating: 3.50
Pub Date: September 17, 2024
I received a complimentary eARC from Simon & Schuster Canada via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own. #Gifted
T H R E E • W O R D S
Introspective • Thoughtful • Leisurely
📖 S Y N O P S I S
When the patriarch of a famed hotel empire dies under suspicious circumstances, his daughter and her estranged brother join forces to find out what happened, unraveling a larger mystery about who their father really was.
Liam Noone was many things to many people. To the public, he was an exacting, self-made hotel magnate fleeing his past. To his three ex-wives, he was a loving albeit distant family man who kept his finances flush and his families carefully separated. To Nora, he was a father who often loved her from afar—notably, a cliffside cottage perched on the California coast where he fell to his death.
The authorities rule the death accidental, but Nora and her estranged brother Sam have other ideas. As Nora and Sam form an uneasy alliance to unravel the mystery, they start putting together the pieces of their father’s past and uncover a family secret that changes everything.
💭 T H O U G H T S
I'd previously read Laura Dave's The Last Thing He Told Me, which I enjoyed, so it was easy to add The Night We Lost Him to my 2024 anticipated releases list. Honestly, I thought the synopsis for this one sounded more intriguing and more along my reading tastes than her previous novel. Unfortunately, it ended up falling a little flat.
Swapping between the present day where Sam and Nora are trying to piece together what really happened and flashbacks to Liam's past, this story felt like a very low stakes mystery. The plot slowly reveals Liam's long held secret. The strength for me was really in how it paints a picture of the life a parent has lived before a child came to know them. There was so much potential to develop that aspect, yet it isn't flushed out to its full capacity.
The writing is engaging and well constructed. As for the characters, they weren't very likeable and they're development felt surface level. In fact, I didn't feel as though I got to know they well enough to ever become fully invested. I continually questioning their motivations and decisions, and maybe that was the point, yet it had the opposite effect for me.
The Night We Lost Him is one of those books I enjoyed reading at the time, yet it didn't wow me. It's a family saga with an underlying love story wrapped up in a mystery. What I really liked is how it asks the question 'how well can we really know the people we love?' Despite this, I felt it kept me at a distance throughout the entire narrative. If you're looking for a page-turning thriller, this isn't it. But if you enjoy slower paced mysteries motivated by grief this will be more your thing.
📚 R E A D • I F • Y O U • L I K E
• family mysteries
• sibling relationships
• short chapters
⚠️ CW: death, death of parent, grief, murder, infidelity, injury/injury detail, medical content, cursing, alcohol, suicidal thoughts, estranged siblings
🔖 F A V O U R I T E • Q U O T E S
"When you lost too much in quick succession, it feels unimageable to risk losing anything else."
"And when you are grieving, guilt lives inside your sadness, doesn’t it? The guilt lives there like an unfortunate side effect of what you haven’t done. You haven’t saved who matters most."
"We can love someone and they love someone else. We can spend a lifetime trying to understand them, without accepting they weren't really ours to understand. We can look someone straight in the eye and never bear witness to the most private part of them - the part they saved just for themselves."
"Pieces help. They help to make you whole. They strip away the shock. They strip it away until, slowly but surely, the shock isn't your entire story. Even when the thing you truly want - the thing my brother and I both still want - is the thing we can't have anymore. Our father standing here, with his mysteries intact. Closer, and farther, at the same time."
"He'll still be the person I recognize before I even know who I see."
Content Warnings
Moderate: Death, Infidelity, Grief, Death of parent
Minor: Cursing, Suicidal thoughts, Medical content, Murder, Alcohol, Injury/Injury detail
estranged siblings