A bravura debut novel, combining the repeating-day scenario of Groundhog Day and others, and a country house murder mystery a la the thirties.

This is one of those books it's best not to say anything concrete about. The plotting is like clockwork, with enough accelerating twists and turns to keep the reader on their toes lest they miss something. And they will miss something, because nobody is reliable.

That said, it took me several weeks to read it. Partly because I knew I couldn't read it when tired, which is my usual reading time. (When I tried, I had to reread those pages.) But the other reason is that I didn't really care about the characters. It's an elegantly written, atmospheric book, but the main character is mostly a cipher, which isn't helped by the fact that he isn't who he thinks he is. (I hope that's sufficiently fuzzy.) And each iteration is equally--exponentially--unpleasant.

I think the reader who will enjoy this most is the reader who likes puzzles, and who can maintain a Nabokovian distance from the puppets covorting so cleverly on this sophisticated stage.

affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.

The 7 1/2 Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle is a twisted mix of Freaky Friday, Groundhog day, and Clue. The narrator of this novel must solve the murder of Evelyn Hardcastle. Evelyn is murdered during a party hosted by her family. The twist? The narrator relives the day of Evelyn’s murder eight times. Each time he is in a different body in a different guest at the Hardcastle party.

This story is an amazing labyrinth of scenes and characters. Scenes and timelines were created 8 different times, with 8 different points of view. It is just amazing that the author is able to have a character in the right place and at the right time to correspond with previous ‘lives.’ Although the storyline is confusing at the beginning, tiny details are revealed with each new POV. These details slowly bring a picture of what is going on into focus for the reader.

As for the characters, they were all especially unlikable and flawed but strong in their own way. These flaws and strengths each help the narrator get closer to an answer in the mystery of Evelyn’s death. The only character that felt awkward to me is the plague doctor. Although his purpose in the story is to fill in gaps for the narrator, I just felt he didn’t fit seamlessly into the story. Otherwise the I think book is perfect.

This work is a masterpiece of suspense. I pride myself on knowing the twists in thrillers but never figured the ending to this one out. This story turned the way I think of master/thrillers upside-down and inside-out.

TSHDoEH will keep to you awake at night, not only reading it but also trying to figure out what the hell is going on here. I think from this point on all other mysteries are going to pale in comparison. The 7 1/2 Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle is a mystery lovers masterpiece.

What an extraordinary novel. This is the reason I love reading. Rather than give anything away about the plot or the characters, all I can say is that the experience of reading this and trying to solve the mystery of Evelyn Hardcastle's murder is unlike any other mystery I have ever read. There are twists and betrayals, moments of humour and times when human nature is exposed as a terrible, beautiful thing.
It's difficult to write a review because I don't want to spoil anything and, frankly, a synopsis would be pointless. Think Alfred Hitchcock meets Agatha Christie meets M Night Shayamalan meets somthing totally unique. Just buy a copy and read it.

The Seven Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle is a thriller following an investigation into the murder of a girl who is murdered every singe night. The main character switches bodies every day in an attempt to get different points of view.

So the thing I’ve seen praised about this book is that the plot is ridiculously complex, and it very much is. I am in awe over the tight plotting used in this book. This must have taken a very long outline and the complexity certainly makes this stand out. I think, however, that the marketing has been very focused on plot twists - I was only seriously shocked by a few twists reading this book, and I’ve already forgotten what, exactly, it was. I will say that the actual ending, though I predicted parts of it, had enough surprises that it was still delightful.

As with many adult thrillers, I struggled to connect to or care about any of the characters. The lead character is almost completely lacking in personality, which makes sense given the entire theme of him being absorbed into bodies, but doesn’t work, as we’re led to believe that he is in constant danger of becoming something awful but never given details to notice or a reason to care. There’s a way of writing a compelling character with amnesia; high motivation, people around them we care about, etc, and this book doesn’t do a great job. I was mostly, however, really disappointed by the bodies Aiden switches into: almost every person he occupies is a completely terrible person. Bell is quite boring and later revealed to be terrible, Mr. Collins spends his entire day in agony, Ravencourt is terrible (and for unrelated reasons his section was my absolute least favorite of the book). That’s just the first three, and I will not be going into the rest because they get much worse.

Something I really enjoyed about this book, however, was the message - this book is very focused on realizing the changeability of people, and though I never cared about any of these characters much, I did find myself believing in and enjoying the message. I think this message is probably the most daring the book ever gets.

..So I actually considered and came very close to rating this book a four star, but I found myself forgetting it very quickly. With a thriller of this type, I usually would have kept my rating a four no matter how much I forgot.

However, the fatphobia in this book was utterly ridiculous. I found it rather disturbing to read such an absolute distate from the narrator and author for the fatness of the character he inhabits: Ravencourt is described as a “pig” and a “cow” over and over, and repeatedly described as “disgusting” with seemingly no regard for his humanity. The imagery of fatness is, exclusively and completely, meant to disgust and shock the audience. It is the main voyeuristic thread of a good 20% of the book. a few quotes are stated here (link in goodreads & blog review), and this reviewer only got to the beginning of this section, at 20%, so can I just say: it’s like, five times that many. I found this incredibly distasteful and disgusting even once, and the near-constant repetition of this rhetoric had me wanting to put the book down. I'm really wondering what the authorial intent is here, and how the author must interact with overweight people in his own life.

I also felt that rape was used as a plot device in a way that made me somewhat uncomfortable - spoiler here - [a bunch of the book is told through the pov of a person who committed a rape approximately two hours before, and it’s criticized, but… the impacts on the victim are very much ignored. This is a huge and very common issue in literary fiction, but I also hated it and it impacted my enjoyment of this as a thriller.]

So… despite many good elements, I kind of just want to tell you to read The Westing Game instead. Nothing but respect for MY president.

There are very few books that I have called “unputdownable,” but there is no better word to describe Stuart Turton’s masterful debut, THE 7½ DEATHS OF EVELYN HARDCASTLE. Set in and around a remote, dilapidated manor known as Blackheath House, this eerie, suspenseful novel asks us what we would do if we could change the past, alter the future, and escape the twisted circle of time with our lives.

The book opens with a smash as we meet a confused and terrified narrator who is running through a forest with no idea who or where he is. If the scene sounds confusing, it definitely is, but what could be a weightless, mind-boggling introduction turns into an epic page-turner in Turton’s deft hands. As our narrator begins to realize that he is not in his proper body, a chase takes off, and he is forced to run for his life while witnessing a woman lose hers. The narrator is soon revealed to be Aiden Bishop, and a meeting with an enigmatic man dressed as a plague doctor --- beak and all --- explains his task.

Aiden came to Blackheath on his own, but now he is stuck in an endless loop where he will be forced to repeat the day of Evelyn Hardcastle’s murder eight times --- in a different body each time. On each repetition of the day, Aiden will awake with yesterday’s knowledge, but also with the restraints that come with each host --- an aging body, a flighty mind and violent tendencies among some of the more memorable traits. By the end of the eighth day, Aiden must find the plague doctor and tell him exactly who murdered Evelyn. The problem is that nearly everyone has a motive, including the men Aiden comes to inhabit, and Blackheath thrives on rumors, lies and blackmail.

Aiden is not sure how many times he has completed the traumatic eight-day loop before, but this time, he has been left with a single searing memory: the name “Anna.” Using his wits, the knowledge of his hosts and some cleverly placed clues, Aiden must figure out who killed Evelyn and who Anna is, and what she means to him. Oh, and steer clear of a knife-wielding footman who is hell-bent on eliminating Aiden and his hosts before he can solve the murder.

What at first glance looks like a murder-mystery dinner party, or a very grown-up game of Clue, takes on new depths through Turton’s skillful character development. As Aiden inhabits new hosts, we learn more about all of the players at Blackheath and, slowly, about Aiden himself. The most interesting, original aspect of this novel is the fact that Aiden is so affected by his host’s abilities. Early on, he inhabits the body of a lecherous, violent man and finds that he has trouble concentrating when women are around. Later, when hosted by a sharp, keenly observant (but corpulent) retired banker, he notices details he had missed on other loops, even when observing the same events. Aided by the banker’s sharp mind, he is able to work through clues and put together connections faster than ever before. The abrupt changes in character help to pace the story and allow readers plenty of room to think about the various clues on their own, but beyond that, they are truly suspenseful and keep you wanting more and more.

Last of all, the setting is like a character in itself. Blackheath is eerie and crumbling, but the signs of its previous glamour are still there. The time period reads like the 1920s, but the book is not old-fashioned and does not get bogged down in historical detail. Instead, reading the book is like playing a video game set during a much more glamorous age, and Turton aligns the timeless with the modern with seemingly no effort at all.

It is difficult to describe the plot, but it is truly impossible to sum up the genius of its creator. Turton has crafted a perfectly plotted mystery, and his characters’ motivations are believable, morally gray and compulsively readable. The tension grabs you from the very first page and does not let go for one second. There are twists and turns on nearly every page, yet Turton manages to keep this riveting book understandable and easy to navigate. Would-be detectives will delight at his many red herrings and clues, taking comfort in the knowledge that he has truly thought of every last detail. I am actually already planning a reread of this incredible novel so that I can watch the details play out and really enjoy Turton’s genius as a whole. I suspect this is how many readers will feel once they get to the delicious final twist.

Given Turton’s absolutely flawless plotting, it is nearly impossible to believe that THE 7½ DEATHS OF EVELYN HARDCASTLE is his debut. The good news is that we can look forward to his future literary contributions with excitement, eagerness and just a dash of fear.

This was an incredibly gripping novel that keeps you at the edge of your seat! I loved the great sense of mystery and the character immersion.

The premise of this book really appealed to me, so I'm disappointed to report that I didn't enjoy it. Judging from other readers' reviews, I'm an outlier, but I just couldn't get into this. While the pacing and plot twists were well done, I didn't know who the Aiden Bishop was and wasn't invested in him. Because the story began with him already inhabiting one of his hosts, I didn't have anything to latch onto and it took far too long for me to even get to know Aiden as an individual character. It wasn't confusing, I just didn't care.

Interesting concept. A man is dropped into a country-house mystery, and has to live the day eight times, each time in a different participant's body. There's a complicated cosmological reason for this, involving people in plague costumes, punishment for crimes, and more murder. Our main character has to solve the murder to escape. So it's supposed to be a bit of a puzzle mysery. Unfortunately, while I'm confident that the eight timelines probably mesh together very well, there are lots of bone-head annoyances in the book. Small things like a short walk and conversation being followed by a remark that hours had passed, leaving us wondering what happened to the time. Or why future versions of the main character send the past version such bone-head cryptic messages.

And then there are the big plot holes. While the extremely complicated scheduling of daily actions and interactions takes a lot of space in the book, the background story is just kinda bone-headed in a lot of ways. Apparently, long ago, the mom, Helena, entered into a loveless arranged marriage with Pete, for money and position. He was unfaithful, and so was the wife. She had sex with both the husband and the lover. But when she got pregnant, everyone somehow knew it was the lover's child. So she sent the baby away, said it died, and then paid one of her husband's mistresses to deliver the baby back to the family saying it was hers, and it was raised by the cook, but also with her other children, who were also the lover's children, but which she passes off as her husband's. How did she know the children were the lover's and not the husband's? The husband said that they could be his. Why would she have concocted this complicated story which would result in her son being raised as a servant's child? It was just bone-headed.

And then, Evelyn fakes her suicide in public. (Although it turns out to not be Evelyn.) She takes muscle relaxers to help her be deathlike, and she taken by the doctor, who is a conspirator, to a room afterward. Her brother, Michael, tries to kill this unconscious woman. He is stopped. He takes a drink of strychnine-laced scotch and as he reacts to the poison, the unconscious woman suddenly wakes up and starts reacting as well. Our hero has the remedy, and has to decide who to save, and he chooses the woman. Why was she unconscious? How is it that she suddenly wakes and then reacts to the strychnine-laced scotch that she drank about an hour before?

It did have a nice twist ending, although the guilty party wasn't introduced until the very end of the book, so the culprit wasn't really something you could puzzle out.

It tried really hard, but just didn’t hang together.

Thanks to Netgallery for a review copy.

I liked the premise and format of Evelyn Hardcastle, but I struggled with getting into the story. Not for me, but I am sure it will be well loved by several.

7 1/2 deaths is a challenging book, challenging your mind as well as your patience. It’s been described as Agatha Christie goes to Downton Abbey. I liken the novel more to an endless game of Clue, with a. crime that has many potential perpetrators— so many in fact that the reader may easily lose the thread of the narrative. Add to this a dose of Groundhog Day or Memento and you have quite a task at hand. At first it seemed a bit like Wilkie Collins but then it made me wish I had a Tom Collins to get me through the endless labyrinth.

I’m very sure that I requested for this book because it was supposed to be a twist on the usual murder mystery. Well, it definitely was different.

In The 7 1/2 Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle, Aiden wakes up every day in the body of a different person. He also has to relieve each day, watching Evelyn Hardcastle die at 11:00. And until he can figure out who killed her by his last host, he’s doomed.

I can’t really say too much of the plot here because:

1. It would result in a spoiler

2. I’m still confused.

While this was a very clever book, I found it quite confusing. It’s probably because we’re thrown into the narrative with Aiden, who wakes up with a name on his mind but absolutely no idea what’s going on. The first part of the book was basically him trying to understand the whole situation.

Another reason why it confused me was the sheer number of characters. Aiden has 8 hosts and after finishing the story, I still can’t remember any of them. While the book does show Aiden grappling with the characters of the host, all the hosts had the same voice (probably Aiden’s) to me, which made it hard to distinguish between them (and between them and Aiden)

That said, I did understand the ending of the book and thought it was very exciting. Somehow, I managed to understand one plotline and the final few chapters were tightly written and got me hooked. I think that if the first half of the book was the same, I would have understood it more and have been less confused.

I would like to comment on Aiden but I don’t have an opinion of him. Perhaps it’s because he spent most of the book unaware of himself, but I never really got a good sense of what he was like as a person. It always felt that the mystery was the goal and he was sort of fumbling towards it (until the ending, where he came up with a plan and things got interesting).

To be honest, I’m not sure if I would have finished this book if it wasn’t from NetGalley. While it’s very cleverly executed and the ending was good, the beginning was confusing and I never connected with Aiden or the other characters. I normally need either the world or the characters to keep me reading and I didn’t get ‘hooked’ until later in this book.

Mystery fans may enjoy this, but be sure that you know what you’re getting into. This isn’t going to be a typical light read – you’ll have to be able to keep track of a huge cast of characters while trying to solve a murder. If you think you’re up to it, then the world of the Hardcastles awaits.

Disclaimer: I got a free copy of this book from the publisher via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

A man wakes up alone in a forest without his memory. He has no idea who he is, why he is overcome with a sense of being watched, or why he keeps thinking of a woman named Anna. He makes his way to a house filled with other guests in hopes he will find a clue to his identity. Shortly, he learns his name is Aiden Bishop and he is tasked with a strange quest by a masked man: "Somebody’s going to be murdered at the ball tonight. It won’t appear to be a murder so the murderer won’t be caught. Rectify that injustice and I’ll show you the way out." Aiden is allowed one day in each body, with a total of 8 identities, to solve the mystery or his memory will be wiped and he will have to start again. To make things even more complicated, there are others that will stop at nothing to ensure Aiden does not succeed.
This book has been described as being "Agatha Christie meets Quantum Leap" and I could not possibly agree more with that assessment. There are so many twists and turns that I could not put down the book until I found out who killed Evelyn Hardcastle. This book sat with me for days after I finished and I immediately told nearly every reader I know that they have to immediately get this book. I have had genre fatigue because so many mysteries have been variations of the same old tired trope; I was delighted to find Turton's debut novel to be a fresh take on the genre.
The 7 1/2 Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle is easily the best book I have read all year and I strongly urge anyone who loves a good whodunnit to get it. Additionally, if you are trying to ease yourself into a new genre, this is an excellent segue into historical fiction, science fiction, and mystery.

What a brilliant and clever idea for a whodunnit! You can't skim read this, you need to follow it carefully to make an attempt at putting all the clues together. Aiden Bishop is given the task of solving a murder, which he attempts to do over a period of a week by seeing each day through the eyes of a different guest at the party at Blackheath. There is so much information and many threads to the mystery. I found it very easy to visualise Blackheath and all of the characters, particularly Ravencourt.
This book keeps you guessing all the way through, just as a good whodunnit should! Highly recommend.
Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for an ARC.

3.5 stars. I was very intrigued by the mystery in this one. The author developed such an intricate and complex story. It was at times a lot to take in and keep straight. Also thought it was a little long.

The 7 1/2 Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle has, by far, one of the most intriguing premises of any book I've ever read. Aiden Bishop (whose name we don't get until like 50% of the way into the book, even though it's on the back cover??) is put into a new body each day for eight days and must solve the murder of a woman he doesn't know or else he'll be stuck in a loop forever. So pretty normal stuff.

Evelyn Hardcastle's plot was something straight out of Agatha Christie. I read A LOT of murder mysteries and crime books, and normally I can figure out the pattern and at least piece together part of the mystery before it's revealed. This was some Murder on the Orient Express or And Then There Were None plotting, because I didn't have a clue what was going on until it was revealed.

That being said, the premise of this book is pretty confusing, and I spent about 2/3 of the book trying to figure out the "rules" of the universe the book was set in (it doesn't help that Aiden Bishop himself knows just about nothing about his universe either). I feel like part of the reason the murderer is so hard to guess/figure out is because the reader is spending the majority of his or her time trying to figure out what's going on in the first place (who's getting murdered? who's who? etc.). Don't get me wrong, I'm not blaming my inability to figure out the killer on bad world-building: the plot was really and truly convoluted (but followable) and I doubt I'd be able to solve the mystery even if it were set in the modern day.

While the premise of Aiden waking up in different bodies each day is intriguing, their personalities seem to leak into his, and as a result I felt I never really got to know Aiden himself, or any of the other characters. The moment I'd get invested in or attached to a host, he'd be gone, replaced by the next one. The one host that I did really connect to and enjoy reading about was gone within a few chapters and never even made a cameo again.

Also, Aiden seemed overly invested in both Evelyn Hardcastle and Anna, a mysterious woman he has a connection to. Considering that Aiden has lost all of his memories and is struggling to first find his footing and then escape himself, I was a bit confused by his concern for the well-being of two women he didn't really know. His connection to them was necessary to advance the plot, but beyond that the relationships didn't really make much sense.

Overall, a solid mystery, even if it was lacking in characterization and world-building. 3.5/5 stars.

I am a sucker for mysteries! I thought the plot was really intricate and the mystery layered well. I enjoyed the book despite some issues (the main one being a bit of fat shaming, but if you can get over that you will be fine). And I didn't necessarily get over it. But I still liked the read, and the plot twists I did not see coming!

Looking at the majority of other reviews, I recognize I am going to be alone on this one. I struggle with “ The7 1/2 Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle”. Admittingly, I’ve been in a massive reading slump this Fall but this much loved mystery couldn’t shake me out of it. I struggled from start to finish. Reliving the same day eight different times made it all the more difficult. I found the writing stiff and unengaging causing each “re-do” to be all the more taxing to read. This was a literary puzzle I truly did not enjoy.

"Evelyn Hardcastle will be murdered at 11:00 p.m.
There are eight days, and eight witnesses for you to inhabit.
We will only let you escape once you tell us the name of the killer.
Understood? Then let's begin..."

Sounds cool, right? Well, it is. The concept of this book is extremely inventive. There's a huge party at Blackheath Manor, Lady Evelyn Hardcastle is murdered, and our protagonist has eight days to figure out the culprit or be trapped reliving the same night forever. During this time he lives the life of eight people while investigating the murder. The fact that the author was able to keep straight all of the characters and their time leaps while crafting this idea into a cohesive story is jaw dropping. Bravo!

I didn't struggle to keep up with the goings-on, but I had a hard time with the pacing of this novel. It seriously stretched the plot out for what felt quite a bit too long. The slow pace definitely effected my connection with the characters. It got to the point where I just wanted to finish and did't care that much about the who, what and why anymore. The long lack of clarity  caused me to lose interest several times, unfortunately.

The conclusion was a bit lackluster for me. Things didn't wrap up as neatly as I hoped. Especially, after struggling to get to the end. I was anticipating a more elaborate finish considering how detailed and intricate the story was.  Fret not if this is on your tbr, it's a strong debut! The 7 1/2 Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle is a solid murder mystery with a refreshingly awesome approach. My only gripe, I just wished we knew what we were fearing or rooting for way sooner.

I recommend it.

Wow, I loved how everything came together. It was certainly a little confusing while reading but the ending was superb and was unexpected.

Rating: 3.5. While the premise of this book intrigued me I found that I wasn't expecting the plot. I was definitely confused for the first quarter of the book, expecting an Agatha Christie like premise and us getting to see through the eyes of a detective who can take over different characters to solve the mystery of a murdered woman. When we finally got into the swing of things I did actually enjoy the ride. It was an interesting take on a murder mystery. I definitely had to keep my wits about me reading this because we experience so many different characters and timelines that it can get confusing fast. I really liked this book up until the end. The ending felt like a little bit of a letdown to me. I liked the backstory to Blackheath (however small that was) and I found myself wanting more about that mystery as opposed to the one we get. While I enjoyed our main character's Aiden's journey through the characters it felt tedious at times repeating the same information. I wasn't a fan of the twist ending but I would be interested in seeing what happen now. Overall, not a bad mystery.

I received an ARC of this book via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.