I enjoyed reading this story and found it to pull me in right from the beginning - the action starts right away with the finding of Beth's body...

I liked the way the story developed - with a detective who had a bit of a 'thing' about Beth to begin with and who had been intrigued by her after he had helped save her from a previous trauma. It meant that it added extra layers to this - was this detective obsessive? Was he a suspect? Was it her husband? Her husband's girlfriend?! Who?!

I enjoyed the mystery and admit that I was really drawn in.

However, I have to give this book 4 stars, not 5, because there was one large part of this story which I felt was totally overlooked. The fact that Beth died whilst heavily pregnant. There appeared to be no grief for the unborn baby, who had even had a name. The sister of this baby didn't even seem to mention it, the auntie nothing, the father?? No mention at all when they first found out that Beth and the baby had died. It was really odd. Surely the auntie, the father, the sister of a dead baby would refer to it and wonder about its life and what it could have become... very odd to have been missed off.

I haven't read a Luanne Rice book in awhile, but I remember her stories about family set on the Northeast coast. I was pleasantly surprised to see that this was a mystery/suspense story dealing with a family that has seen their share of tragedy and hardship. Sisters Kate and Beth had been tied up with their mother in the basement of the family art gallery years ago. Their mother died during their confinement and the girls' lives would never be the same. At the same time a painting, Moonlight had been stolen, yet recovered when the thieves were found. Years later, Kate finds her sister's body dead in her home, once again, Moonlight has been stolen. Who killed Beth and why? Once again Connor Reid is on the case.

This book starts off with a bang, the discovery of Beth's body. I was hooked and couldn't wait to figure out what happened, and who was responsible. Most of the story is told from Kate's POV. She does not think much of Pete, Beth's husband, and is sure he had something to do with the murder. There are a lot of characters in the story and all are involved in some way. Nicola is Pete's mistress and the mother of his illegitimate son, Sam is his daughter who is angry and wants nothing to do with her father, there are a couple of female friends that are Beth and Kate's BFF, their children and Tom who is Connor's brother. I got somewhat confused and found the mystery got a bit bogged down. I did like that the author shows how a murder affects the family and didn't brush it under the rug. I was pretty sure I had it figured out from the start, but changed my mind about 2/3 of the way in and found that I was correct. As the murder wraps up, I wasn't impressed with the motive of the killer. The ending seemed meh, after all the investigating. Overall, I was just okay with this story. It was not what I had been expecting.

The Last Day by Luanne Rice
I was hooked immediately by the plot of this book. I read the book in every spare moment so I could find out who the murderer was. I am leaving names out of this review on purpose. It has been a while since I read a book that I couldn’t put down and when it ended - I wanted more.. Run don’t walk and go buy this book.

Favorite Quotes:

He always thought of his first encounter with a homicide victim as two people meeting. An encounter every bit as important in death as it would have been in life, as revelatory as a conversation— in some ways more so.

She had the feeling she might fall off the world. Everything felt dangerous; she wasn’t sure her skin could hold her bones and blood and heart inside.

She was the crème brûlée of mothers: hard shell on the outside, total mush on the inside.

Every few weeks the morgue was called here to remove a body—mostly overdoses, some accidental and some suicides. The walls were soaked with the sadness of lonely people drinking themselves to death in their small rooms.

Surreptitiously, on the side Lulu couldn’t see, Scotty grabbed the roll of fat around her waist. The old commercial used to say if you could pinch more than an inch you needed to eat their cereal and get into shape. Scotty could pinch half a foot.

My Review:

Brilliantly conceived, cunningly plotted, diabolically crafted, shrewdly paced, and skillfully written. This book was da bomb! I was taut with tension with my shoulders in my ears and so sure I knew who had killed Beth, but, silly me, I was - so – very - wrong! This was my introduction to the skilled and breathtaking art form found in the wordcraft of Luanne Rice. I was enthralled, riveted, confounded, and ensorcelled. Ms. Rice was obviously gifted by the fairies of lexicon with mad skills. Her word voodoo is strong. I am her newest and most ardent fangirl.

3.75 stars. This book captivated me from the beginning but I found that it dragged near the end. Lots of mystery from the get-go that did keep me up reading late into the night though.
A good book to take on holidays or to the beach. Family/friend secrets, murder, deceit, the usual....Interesting characters, entertaining enough if this is what you enjoy.

The story was very good and I finished the book because I wanted to know the answers, but what made it hard to get through was the characters. I felt they were very one dementional.

Last Day opens with a seemingly peaceful scene, but looks can be deceiving. After a strong and shocking opening, I was hoping for a good murder mystery. The mystery was there, but it didn't live up to my expectations. For me, the story moved too slowly and was a bit repetitive. I felt like I was skimming in places. Part of my issue was the multiple points of view. I'm not a fan in general of the same story told through a lot of different character eyes. One point of view in particular toward the end I really disliked and honestly took me out of the story. I didn't think it was necessary.

There are a few twists and surprises and the ending was a surprise. However, I didn't like it or think it was satisfying. It's not a bad book, it just wasn't what I was hoping for. I think I am in the minority when it comes to this book. So definitely try it out for yourself.

I had been advanced a copy of Luanne Rice's thriller Last Day by NetGalley and let me thank them, the author and the publisher at the outset.

Last Day is set in Connecticut and is a story of four women who have grown up together. Though touted as a thriller, I found it hard to see it as one purely. Rather Last Day is an emotional journey about friendship and sisterhood.

Beth Woodward is found dead in her bedroom. Her head has been smashed and she has been strangulated with her lace panties. The killer had put the air conditioning at the highest to ensure that the body decay is slowed down and maybe had violated Beth before extinguishing the flame of her life. Beth was six months pregnant. A painting that hung in her bedroom is gone.

Beth was discovered by her sister Kate who is a pilot and who raised an alarm after she had failed to get any response from her sister, who was going through a difficult pregnancy, for three days. Beth was home alone as her husband had one sailing and her daughter was at the camp. Kate, Beth, Lulu and Scotty formed a tight circle and were best friends. Kate and Beth had undergone a similar tragedy and trauma during their childhood when two thieves had tied them up along with their mother in the basement of the art gallery that their family owned. The case was cracked by Connor Reid then and he is the first detective to reach the scene of crime this time as well.

Though these facts present themselves as premise for a edge-of-the-seat thriller, Rice works more on
the weight of emotions that this death means to everyone who was touched by Beth- her daughter, her husband, sister and friends as well as the detective involved. The story proceeds as Kate tries to dig up more about her sister's life in an attempt to find out her killer. Gradually she discovers a side of her sister that she was clueless about. Somewhat heartbroken at things that Beth kept from her but told the other two friends, Kate also figures out how to be more of an aunt to Sam. The other women also have their secrets and vices. Thrown in into this mix are a couple of other suspects who on the surface do not have anything to do with Beth but could be involved with the crime.

Though the book read well and the story seemed to progress in a neat trajectory yet somewhere along the way the thriller gets buried into the emotional devastation of the people concerned and the ending is a disappointment. Read it if you like long drawn out narratives instead of pacy thrillers.

While I have read this author before, it’s been awhile and after reading this, I don’t know why... I enjoyed this book and look forward to reading more from this author

3.5 stars. I would have given this good mystery 4 stars except for I didn't like the odd choice of having the dead person speak at the end. I took me out of the book and I found it completely unnecessary.
Otherwise, this book was very good and I really enjoyed it.

This was my first Luanne Rice book but she's a well-known mystery writer and I her skill, style, and experience are evident. I would definitely read other books by her.

Set in coastal Connecticut, a murder and art theft are linked by a similar occurrence years before. The families and friends of the decreased reel from the murder and try to make sure of the violence and how to mourn, unravel the mystery, and move on with their lives. This book is for fans of Laura Lippman (although it's less noir) or Louise Penny (although I liked this better- good character development and more action.)

Thank you to Netgalley for the free, advance copy.

A few years back if you had asked me for a list of my favorite authors Luanne Rice would have been in the top ten, hands down. When I went on vacation, I always made sure to pack her newest book so that I could savor it, which, of course, usually meant reading it in one single day on the beach. Somehow, she’s written many novels in the past few years which have gotten away from me. One of the odd quirks of being a book blogger, I’ve realized, is that sometimes you lose track of your favorites upon discovery of new writers.

I was thrilled when the publisher provided me with an ARC of Last Day at the end of last week and also thrilled to discover that Luanne Rice is still on my favorite writer list.

Last Day is like and unlike a typical Rice novel. At its heart are women as there always are. Sisters by blood, sisters by fate. Daughters. Mothers. Grandmothers. Perhaps not all of them are embodied in the novel, but their spirits linger.

The novel opens with Kate finding her sister, Beth, dead, murdered. The murder scene is unflinchingly described, which may have surprised me and told me that I was not reading a typical Rice novel.

This is a mystery told from multiple points-of-view, one from the dead woman herself, adding a touch of mystical to the proceedings. As with all good mysteries, the reader is kept guessing, certain that it must be the sleazy, arrogant husband but then realizing that the clues may point in a decidedly different direction leading one to think that it might be someone totally unexpected.

Despite the fact that this is a mystery, it’s also a character-driven novel. We enter the lives of multiple characters. Discover their passion. Their lack of. We discover their foibles, their loyalties, their relationships, the relationships that are secrets . . . and the secrets.

Secrets come up time and time again. Everyone keeps secrets. Even when you think you know someone very well, when you’ve claimed that you will share everything and that there will be no secrets, there are secrets.

Which leads to the ultimate question: how well do we ever really know anyone? What buttons do we push to change their behavior in such a way that they are totally unrecognizable? That they might do us harm?

So many twists and turns. So much to think about. A very good book.

I received an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Great read in many ways but a little too much repetition. The killer came out of nowhere for an odd motive. Other than that the actual plot was very good
Thank you netgalley and the publisher for this arc

So. I don't even know where to start. This book starts out really interesting. It really drew me in at the beginning and I was enjoying it quite a lot for about the first hundred pages or so. It covered the background details well, including the crime that happened when the girls were children, resulting in the death of their mother.

But. This book had serious pacing issues and that's where it lost me. From the moment the book starts, it went all in on the red herring, basically waving him in your face from the get go. Which meant there was absolutely no way he was going to be the killer, even though he was actually the ONLY likely candidate with a motive that was well planned out and believable. That made the actual killer very easy to pick out from the background characters and also, unfortunately, meant their motives were unclear and, honestly, not even slightly believable.

My main problem with this book is that it felt like the entire ending was just so there would be a "twist" and then it wrapped up super fast. The rest of the case was drawn out a little too long and in the middle of the book I ended up bored, just wishing it would end already because I'd already figured out who the killer might be (though I hoped it wouldn't because it also didn't make sense?) and just wanted to get the whole book over with.

The main problem is that this book went all in with the red herring and, apparently, left little room for anything else. Because the actual ending didn't really leave any resolution. The killer's motives are only vaguely explained and, honestly, I didn't buy it AT ALL (the red herring felt like the only plausible suspect, with understandable motives) and then it was over. And the two chapters from the pov of the deceased were absolutely cringeworthy and completely unnecessary.

So. To recap, I just wish there had been other, more plausible candidates? Because it felt like there was one and it was so in your face that it obviously wasn't right, and then a handful of others to choose from that just didn't really make sense. And one of those was chosen just so the book could end with a twist. Which disappoints me greatly because this book started out very promising. I wish there had been more plausible candidates to choose from to keep you guessing.

But, anyway, it's done and I can finally move on to something else. It took me way longer to read this book than it should've purely because the middle is so messy. And the entire book just left me feeling very 'meh' at the end. I wanted to like this book but it ended up just not being for me. I like a little more meat to my mysteries.

Thank you to NetGalley and Thomas & Mercer for allowing me the chance to read and review this book!

Luanne Rice’s newest novel, “Last Day”, is, at face-value, a simple domestic murder mystery. Beth Lathrop is a successful art gallery owner, wife to Pete, mother to teenage Samantha, and six months pregnant with her son, Matthew. The book opens with Beth laying in bed, her phone ringing non-stop. After a description of the scene around her, we discover that Beth is not just taking a pregnancy nap—she is dead. What comes next seems very easy to figure out: an art gallery owner is murdered, a famous painting has been stolen from her home, mirroring a past crime against the same family, with the same painting. History is repeating itself, and once we find out that Pete has been having an affair with Beth’s assistant, the mystery seems very cut and dry—or is it? Beth’s sister Kate and the detective on the case are about to discover that not everything is as it seems, and sometimes the secrets to solving the murder are hidden in the least likely places.
I really enjoyed this novel. I have never read a Luanne Rice book before and am happy to have found a new favorite author! In the beginning, I thought I might end up disappointed; that the novel would follow the basic mystery tropes. Rice threw just enough curve balls to keep me guessing until right before all was revealed. The best part of all the twists was that each had hints and clues dropped throughout the book, so you had everything you needed to solve all the mysteries!
I recommend this book if you love murder mysteries and family dramas. 5/5 stars!

Instagram: @a_necessary_library

I received a copy of this book from the publisher through NetGalley in exchange for an honest review. I have read other books by Luanne Rice before, though I don't remember being as drawn in to the story as I was with this one. Beth and Kate were the victims of a violent crime that left their mother dead when they were teenagers; what made it worse was that the crime was orchestrated by someone they loved and trusted. Now, years later, Beth is found murdered in her home. It is a tragic story filled with so many betrayals.

At the center of the story is a police detective who has watched over the girls after he found them at the site of the murder of their mother. As Beth's friends and family try to piece together what happened on her last day, secrets are revealed that make Kate wonder just how well she really knew her sister.

I gave this one 4 stars because it really kept me guessing, and I could not put it down. I couldn't quite give it 5 stars, because the ending felt a little rushed, and I wish there was more time devoted to wrapping up all of the intertwined stories.

This is the first work by this author I’ve read and, sadly, I probably won’t be seeking out her novels. The storyline had promise - New England seaside community rocked by a horrific crime, family drama, intense and complicated relationships - it has the makings of a solid mystery or domestic thriller. I’m not quite sure where this one falls. It’s overwritten for sure - far too many unnecessary details woven into a story that is inconsistent in its telling. Character development is poor and incredibly inconsistent. The plot “twist” seems rushed and implausible. Overall this was just ok - some solid editing work would have helped this tremendously.

Twenty years ago, two sisters and their mother are tied up and left in the basement of their families art gallery. The mother ends up dying in that basement while her two daughters are helpless to help her. Intriguing premise and one that has many twists and turns before you ultimately find out what is going on.
Thank you to NetGallery, the publisher and author for the opportunity to read and review this book.

I've read some of this authors other book and was looking forward to this since I'd not read one in a while. It was okay, but not what I remembered her writing like. Could be read in a day and maybe something most people enjoy...just not my cup of tea. Thank you NetGalley and the publisher for an e-arc in exchange for an honest review.

Twenty three years ago Kate, Beth and their mother were tied together around the pole in the basement of their gallery and thief stole Moonlight. Sisters lost their mother in this accident. And the culprit was their father.

After that incident Kate and Beth tried to move on. Where Beth fully immersed herself in the gallery and in her family, husband and daughter. Kate kept all the emotions inside and got an escape through her flying career.

Detective Reid who rescued Beth and Kate from that incident could never fully overcome it. He swore to protect them from that day onwards. But he couldn't keep his promise. As Beth is found dead in her bedroom and again Moonlight is stolen. The prime suspect is husband. Is history repeating itself? Will Reid be able to solve this case without getting his emotions overwhelm me?

Review-
Portrayal of emotions and characters is very real, raw and hard hitting. How one incident can affect so many people in many different ways.

Beth accepts fully what happened to her family on that day and still gives love to everyone and keeps up the positive charm. Kate who has bottled up all her emotions doesn't let anyone come near her neither gives any feeling any chance.

Author has perfectly captured the human essence at their best and their worst. That no one is perfect and no one lives a perfect life. Characters are so layered that after sometime you just stop expecting anything normal or predictable from them.

The plot definitely sounds very simple but it keeps you guessing till the end that who is the culprit. I feel a book is really very intriguing and gripping where you actually forget about finding the murderer because you are so invest emotionally to the characters.

Reid character was slightly off for me because I felt it was not properly written or executed. I was craving some more depth or layer from his character.

Overall I really enjoyed the book and I am really impressed by the author's depiction of human behavior and their feelings.

“Murder didn’t just take one life, it stole the essence, will, and ease from everyone it touched. It took their old lives and left them to make their way in a completely new and uncertain world.”

Family. Friends. Secrets. Murder. This book has it all, and then some. Beth Lathrop and her sister Kate are victims in a horrific crime that leaves their mother dead. Fast forward approximately 20 years and now Beth is found dead in an equally horrific way. First detective on the scene is Conor Reid, who was a newbie on the first case. This becomes something personal as he works the case and follows all leads.

This is a typical murder mystery with a lot of family drama and secrets thrown in. Four childhood friends consider themselves as a Compass Rose. This story delves into the complexities of this friendship, and the secrets they all hold. Characters are semi-likeable, although a few I found to be quite shallow. Story line moves at a fairly quick pace but parts seemed to be to drawn out for my liking. Where I thought the story might go, just seems to drop off and is never fully explained or revisited. I did like Beth’s point of view that was added towards the end.

Thanks to NetGalley and Thomas & Mercer for this ARC. Opinion is mine alone.