RachelRavess

” Too little information and you’re blind. Too much information and you’re blinded”

Let me just start off by saying; I’m always up for a good mind-bending murder mystery novel. Something about the complexity of these types of books always leaves me interested until the very last page to find out the intricacies of how the ending will play out and finally figure out who-dun-it.

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Synopsis Summary: Evelyn Hardcastle will be murdered at exactly 11:00 pm every single day, and the only way to break the cycle is to discover and say the name of her killer. Your real name is Aiden Bishop, but you won’t realize that for a little while. You will have no previous memories of your own life, or how you got to Blackheath. You have eight days, and eight different hosts to inhabit within the dreary confines of Blackheath Manor, each with their own unique perspectives and relationships with the victim. Some of the hosts are more helpful than others, and the clues you get along the way will be vague. Again, we will only let you escape once you tell us the name of the killer. Understood? Good, then let’s begin.

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Captivating, right? There was so much that I enjoyed about this book, and some others that I did not especially care for. The plot itself is utterly unique and refreshing, which is what drew my attention to this story in the first place. The writing and language that is used is captivating and believable. Within the first few chapters of this book, you can absolutely tell that the author went to great lengths to keep track of every single detail so that they can be weaved back together in some type of insanely intricate knot. The mystery itself has multiple layers, so the more we find out; the more we’re left questioning.

With that being said, because this particular book has an abundance of details and complex story line, I found that it was to the point that it was difficult to keep up with. It’s almost as if the abundance of details becomes to contradict themselves as the story progresses.

One thing that I wished had been different is the lack of background of one of our main characters: Aiden Bishop. This information does not appear until closer to the end of the book, and I wished it would have come sooner. I personally think it would have helped make a lot more sense of the man within the different hosts and why that’s important.

You really have to pay a lot of attention to not get lost within the different characters stories, which I found to be particularly true within the first half of this book which explains in great detail the hosts and their relationships to Evelyn and the Hardcastle family, minus the man going between the hosts themselves.

I found that the complexity of the story made the big reveal at the end of the book confusing and left me with more questions than answers. The ending wasn’t quite straightforward, though it did tie most of the bigger questions together. Even now that I have finished the book, I’m still not quite sure that I understand everything completely. There are still many questions left unanswered. Maybe that was part of the story; maybe that’s what the author’s purpose was. If so, mission accomplished.

Although I found the ending of this book to be lacking in its overall shock value and ability to tie the rest of the story together, I did find that one of the main themes in this book to be as captivating as the story itself. The ability of a person to change. The realness of who they really are deep down inside, and the contrasting rawness of seeing people for who they really are when backed into a corner. It’s contradicting, really. Seeing the ability of someone to become better than who they used to be; while also seeing how people will never change who they truly are underneath the surface.

Overall, I would say that I enjoyed this book. If you’re a fan of mystery, thriller, and murder books of any kind- I implore you to go into this book with as little information as possible as to come up with your own conclusions. It’s a wild ride. Make a cup of coffee, take a comfy seat, and get ready to try and figure out this extremely intricate book.

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As always, Happy Reading.

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