Stuart Turton
Publication Date: 18 Sept 2018
Book Blurb:
How do you stop a murder that’s already happened?
The Hardcastle family is hosting a masquerade at their home, and their daughter Evelyn Hardcastle will die. She will die everyday until Aiden Bishop is able identify her killer and break the cycle.
But every time the day begins again, Aiden wakes up each day in a different body as one of the guests.
Aiden’s only escape is to solve Evelyn Hardcastle’s murder and conquer the shadows of an enemy he struggles to even comprehend. But nothing and no one are quite what they seem. Deeply atmospheric and ingeniously plotted, The 7½ Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle is a highly original debut that's an Agatha Christie mystery in a Groundhog Day Loop, with a bit of Quantum Leap to it. Perfect for fans of Kate Atkinson and Claire North.
Many years ago as a teenager, I played a lot of Infocom's text adventure games. Those early computer games put you in the middle of the story - you indicated what direction you wanted to go or what you wanted to do - but were all text. Frequently you had little idea of what a given puzzle was, much less how to solve it, until after you had 'died' several times and had to restore from a previous bookmark.
This book reminds me of those games in many ways. Just as with the text adventure games, the reader is given a little bit of background (in the form of the book blurb or game description), but no details of who the character is, or what needs to be done to solve the puzzle (or even what the puzzle is to be solved). The book starts as the protagonist, Aiden Bishop, wakes up in his first host. He has no idea who he is or what his goal is. He isn't even sure who his friends are, who his other hosts are (or even that he has other hosts), or who his enemies are. And yes - he has enemies; there are two others trying to escape by also identifying the killer of Evelyn Hardcastle, and only the one who figures out first escapes. But as he is unaware of who they are, they are unaware of who he is. If none of them solve the mystery, then the loop starts over again with Aiden starting back in his first host (Mild Spoiler - and yes, it's implied that this loop has happened before).
Another part that reminds of those early text adventures is the looping of the day; you get to see different parts of the day through the eyes of different hosts who had different levels of knowledge of the day's events (although in the games, the loop is more controlled by saving or bookmarking your place at a give point in the action).
I loved how Aiden progressed through his hosts, how he reacted to them - getting frustrated by this one's personality and this one's physical traits. It was also fascinating to see how he starts to lose himself; early hosts he had more control over, but bit by bit, he starts to lose himself to their individual personality traits.
And even with all the looping, there's still room for a twist at the end! All in all, a delightful read - this book was more fun that any I've read in a while. Highly recommended.
No comments:
Post a Comment