The Seven Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle book review

The Seven Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle by Stuart Turton
Published by Sourcebooks Landmark on February 8, 2018
Pages: 512
Goodreads

At a gala party thrown by her parents, Evelyn Hardcastle will be killed--again. She's been murdered hundreds of times, and each day, Aiden Bishop is too late to save her. Doomed to repeat the same day over and over, 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 Seven Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle is a highly original debut that will appeal to fans of Kate Atkinson and Agatha Christie.
Also titled as The 7 1/2 Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle.

I want to say that I think that this one would have been a better read rather than an audiobook. The Seven Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle became a rather complex story and one where it became a little bit of a struggle to keep track of who was who and where they were up to in the story. I wish I had the physical copy to see if I had a better reading experience than listening to it. But I don’t think it would be a book that I could reread because I already know the major twist and I’m not sure what the point would be now that I know how everything ends.

I don’t want to spoil anything but I found the characters in The Seven Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle extremely hard to keep track off and there didn’t seem to be a lot of distinguishable features between them all and it made the book a little hard to read. I wish I had been more connected to the main character as a whole because by the end I didn’t really care about him and where he ends up. I thought he was annoying and wasn’t particularly helpful, I ended up with him being my least favourite person. I really struggled to care to be honest, I thought his voice was irritating. That could be because I listened to the audiobook though.

I actually think the best bits of The Seven Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle would have to be the major twist at the end. I did actually enjoy the whole murder mystery and the way that everything ends up working out. I loved watching the characters work out the various clues and I was left not knowing what way it was going to go all the way up to the end. I had an idea but the actual reveal blew me away a little, which is something I really appreciate that in a mystery book which is why I bumped it up from 2 stars to 3 stars.

I think the worst bits of The Seven Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle would have to be the how hard it was to keep track of the timelines and the different days. I still don’t know how the whole thing worked and that made the whole thing really confusing and I couldn’t really enjoy the story because I was spending so much time trying to work out where we were in the story and why certain things were happening. It made for really tough reading at times.

I don’t know what my feelings are about recommending The Seven Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle, I think you have to be a certain type of person to love this book and to understand where the story was going. I just think it missed the mark for me and I wanted something different from the story, and I think my expectations got in the way!

Have you read a book that had a brilliant ending but still didn’t hit the mark? Which ones were they?