Hmm. A tricky one to review. I liked this book and also disliked it. But not for the reasons I was expecting. I knew a very vague outline of what this book was about, and I knew a lot of people online had read it and enjoyed it. They seemed to give out a lot of the same warnings: initially the book is very slow to get into as you have to be introduced to all of the characters. I didn't find this to be the case. I was immediately interested by this book from the first chapter. I thought it was excellently written and despite it being over 500 pages, I didn't find there to be any issues with the pacing. However (now watch me be rude), the twists added to keep the momentum and excitement up, didn't feel shocking enough. It was quite disappointing in this sense as I was invested in the story and our main protagonist, despite the fact he ends up in some bizarre time-travelling scenario where he keeps waking up in different people's bodies. This was all good fun. But the twists were undoubtedly...flat. The main essence of this book is down to the 'game' involved in discovering the murderer, but jumping between so many characters, and therefore having so many characters involved made it not the easiest to make sense of. Perhaps there were one too many characters he jumps into, and we could have done with The Six Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle. Despite me personally not finding issues with pacing, it dragged. It ultimately verged on being a bit dull. I'd say this definitely matches up to an Agatha Christie-esque murder mystery: set in a haunting, isolated mansion with lots of high society people getting killed off. The characters felt more developed than in Christe's books, and it was certainly unique to anything I have read from this genre which does make it quite a special book.
If you're a murder mystery fan, read it. If you're an Agatha Christie fan, read it. If you're staying in a haunted mansion for a long weekend, 100% read this or else. I definitely found it a page turner, as I desperately wanted more information, but I think it missed the mark for me, purely because it isn't my preference within this genre
Initial Prediction: 3.5 stars
Final Rating: 3.5 stars
Publication Date: 8 February 2018 (my edition: 1 October 2018)
Publisher: Raven Books, Bloomsbury
Genres: Mystery, Thriller
# of Pages: 507