📚Review: The Fury 🏝️
This book was so fun. I received this as an ARC from @netgalley and had to start it right away. It has been one of my most anticipated reads for 2024, so I was super excited that I finally had got approved. The Silent Patient by this same author is one of my all time favorite books, so I have been patiently waiting for his next book. Although this was nothing at all like The Silent Patient, I still really liked and enjoyed this book a lot. Talk about unreliable narrators! Wow! I really liked how the narrator “talked” to the readers as he went on with telling his story. I thought that was unique and well done. 👏🏻👏🏻
This last 25% of the book was so good and suspenseful, I had to keep going to find out what was going to happen. Not to mention the twists that kept coming too. After the epilogue my head was spinning. And I thought the ending was so clever. My mouth literally fell open. Without telling too much, this book is about a small group of people who go on vacation on a greek island. The narrator tells the story and introduces each person and you get to know each of their stories and how they are all connected. There is a murder (or two) and you are left trying to figure out who did it and why. It reminded me somewhat of an Agatha Christie book, Evil Under The Sun. (Minus the detective) But it was just so good. Cleverly written. I really enjoyed this one. I hope you do too. It was a ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️/5 stars for me. Be sure to check this one out when it’s released next month. I can’t wait to add it to my collection. Thank you again to @netgalley and @celadonbooks for this ARC in exchange for an honest review.
Pub Date: January 16, 2024.

Have you read any books by this author yet? Which is your favorite?

I LOVED THIS!!!! The silent patient is one of my fav thrillers of all time and his second book, the maidens, I didn't care for. But boy, this was AMAZING!!! I could not put this down. I loved the setting, the writing, everything. THE TWISTS!!! So so good!!

This was such a fun book. I loved the narrators voice and his snarky view on things. I loved the Agatha Christie style mystery. There were a few red herrings and the book kept my guessing until the end. Overall, a great book and I think it’s going to be a hit next year!

"The curtain rises.
And so it begins."

Plot: ★★★★★
Characters: ★★★★☆
Writing: ★★★★★
Concept: ★★★★★
Vibes (can't explain this one, you just feel it): ★★★★☆

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for providing me with an advanced copy of The Fury.

I am so impressed by Mr. Michaelides. But what's new?

If you're a thriller fan, or a Michaelides fan, this is unequivocally the book for you. Do not be fooled by the synopsis of it being about an ex-movie star. In the end, it truly does not matter one little tiny bit that anybody in the story is famous. It is not romanticizing fame and stardom. If anything, it makes me feel quite grateful to be an average, unknown individual.

The Fury is, at its core, a modern-day, wildly convoluted, slightly perverse, Agatha Christie mystery, with more twists and turns than you can ever guess. And I don't say that lightly. I have read so many thrillers that very little surprises me anymore. Well, this surprised the pants right off of me. (Yes, I did guess Major Plot Twist #1, but that matters little when Michaelides included a handful more that I never could have gotten.)

Did I like this book as much as his first two? Now, that is a fantastic question I do not have an answer to. I like them all in their own way. I think that is the best way to describe his stories. Each has their own wit, charm, and set of dynamic (often crazy) characters, and therefore, it is very difficult to compare them.

That being said, I cannot recommend this book enough. It is everything I hoped for and more. That's why I read it in about two days, as a super slow reader. I am so excited for Michaelides' next story, and I really hope he continues to put out these absolutely wonderful, meaningful thrillers.

this is the perfect book for when you just want to spend all day reading about murder and intrigue in a beautiful setting. the twists were satisfying and the main characters were interesting enough. the level of writing is better than your average thriller, though not quite reaching ~~literary. i liked the motif of these winds.

For a book described as a fast paced thriller, it sure was slow moving. This book really drug on and was not the thrilling, page turner, it was described to be. I didn’t hate this book, but I also didn’t love it. I don’t think it was particularly enjoyable because there was never a “grab ahold of you” moment. I never felt like I was on the edge of my seat and absolutely had to know what was happening next. I wanted to enjoy this book, but it was a flop.

Thank you Celadon Books, Netgalley, and Alex Michaelides for the ARC of this book. My review is entirely my own opinion.

The Fury is a tale narrated by Elliot. He is best friends with Lana. She is married to Jason and her best friend is Kate. The four of them are all living in England. Lana was a famous actress. Kate is a current actress. Elliott is a writer of sorts. The friends all go to stay on the island that Lana owns off the Greece coast. When the story starts you know that one of them doesn't get out alive. However, the constant changing narrative as written from the perspective Elliot will keep you on your toes guessing. I loved all the twists and turns in the story. I couldn't put the book down and finished it in like 48 hours.

Special thanks to Celeron Books and NetGalley for the ARC of this book.

I definitely would recommend this book if you just love Alex Michaelides and can't get enough of him. I wasn't crazy about The Silent Patient, btw, there is a nod to that in this book. And if you've not read The Silent Patient, definitely don't start this one first. It will kill the mystery. The Fury is the 3rd book I read by him and the worst of the three in my opinion.

I really wanted to like this one but its messy and all over the place and it is slow going in the beginning. The most annoying part was the narrator, Elliot, who is talking to the reader through winks and side glares, making him unreliable, which I usually like. An unreliable narrator usually adds to the story. But not this one folks!

However, I'm sure some people will like, maybe love this book. I just don't see it. What can I say? However, I appreciate the ARC, it was just too all over the place for me. I think if the narration changed, it would've been a notch better. The narrator kept insisting we know this fact or that fact before the big reveal, and it was all too much and sloooow going folks. By the last 100 or so pages, my brain was dead I think because it tidied up a bit there but a little too late for me.

After reading 5 star books, its getting harder and harder to rate books that are just messy. 3 stars. I didn't hate it, just disliked it immensely and I really, really wanted this book to work!

I enjoyed the second half of this book more than the first half. For some reason I found it hard to follow. It was very twisty but that made for it being hard to be believable. I just found the main character, who’s also the narrator, hard to believe. Usually, for me, when that happens, it means the character has some sociopathic tendencies that I find hard to relate to, and I don’t enjoy reading about people that suffer from this. But if you like a book that’s hard to guess where it’s going next, this is the book for you, because it made little sense to me, but it was shocking and I didn’t see any of it coming. I gave it 4 stars because the plot was original, and the ending can’t be guessed, but I didn’t get it less than that, even though it appears I didn’t enjoy it, because I did enjoy the second half, once The plot started down a more linear path. I may have given it 5 stars if I didn’t get so lost in the first half of the book. This is definitely one where the reader will either love it or hate it. I only finished reading it because I’ve enjoyed other books by this author and felt that it had to get good at some point, and it did, but had I never heard of the author before, I may have abandoned the attempt after the first 100 pages…. So if you do pick it up, just keep going.

Thank you to NetGalley and Celadon Books for a copy of this ARC in exchange for an honest review!

4 Stars!

This was a really fun murder mystery/thriller to read. I love that the story told about each character's personality through the narrator. There were definitely twists involved with this story. It caught me off guard because some of the twists come from the narrator themselves. I will say I found some of the story to be slower paced. Some parts where the narrator would backtrack or talk about themselves, it was almost taking away from the anticipation building for the murder. However, I still really enjoyed this thriller, and I would recommend it!

Ex-movie star Lana Farrar takes a group of friends to her private Greek island where one of them ends up dead.

This book has some really interesting bits to it and some things that just didn't work for me. The narration is very meta with the narrator talking to you and breaking up the narrative in different ways that suits him, a la Nick in The Great Gatsby. Actually, Elliot reminds me of Nick a lot. You can't trust him and he works way too hard to remove himself from a narrative that he is driving. While I found this a unique way to tell a story, I didn't find any of the characters very interesting. The story itself is very twisty and reads like an Agatha Christie book with many red herrings. It also feels a little out of time. You can't tell when this is really taking place for most of it. It has this classic feel. This will absolutely find its audience, especially since it so uniquely written.

All in all, an interesting thriller set on a Greek Island.

Thank you to the author, publisher, and NetGalley for the gifted copy. My reviews are always honest.

Elliot is in love with Lana. I mean who isnt but Lana is a movie star so everyone wants to be around her. Elliot likes to think Lana is perfect for him and that her current husband Jason is bad human and should go away along with another friend Kate. Lana and Elliot plan a getaway to a Greek island Lana owns to put their plan in place and Elliot thinks everything is finally going to be go right. But little does he know there is going to be more to this story and things might not go exactly as planned.

This reads a lot like a play or the creation of a play and that made it even the more interesting. It was a very interesting read and I really enjoyed the book. I didnt expect the ending at all and it was something that shocked me to my core which takes a lot. You really think the book is going one way until it completely goes a complete opposite direction. Alex does the dual storylines very well with the flashbacks. It was a book that was unexpected but perfect! I would highly recommend!!!

Thank you NetGalley for the ARC!

As a lover of the Silent Patient, I was really excited to read The Fury. I think the story was fun, Alex Michaelides is great at doing the whole unreliable narrator breaking the fourth wall thing… I feel like that’s his signature at this point.

I will say, after reading the Silent Patient, I was already expecting the twists when they happened in this novel. So it didn’t have the same *gasp* effect on me. Nonetheless, still a fast paced and immersive read.

Thank you to NetGalley and Celadon Books for an advanced ebook copy in exchange for an honest review.

The story structure and narrative voice was such a pleasure to read. Told through the voice of Elliott Chase, through a 5 act Greek Tragedy we learn the “why” of the events that unfurl into a murder mystery.

Lana Farrar is a former Hollywood actress who invites her friends out to her private Island, Aura, for some R&R. The people who she considers closest to her, all have secrets, and their own motivations for coming to the island. What transpires is layers of perspective and intrigue.

Well written, easy to read, and the nod to the Silent Patient was a fun addition.

I love Alex Michaelides and this thriller did not disappoint.
I perceived it as having extremely different vibes than “The Maidens” which was a surprise, but I ultimately felt it was a pleasant one.

The prose, structure and themes are highly theatrical and tongue in cheek. The narrator is self aware in the similarities to Agatha Christie’s tales.
But the truly enjoyable part for me is that the mystery didn’t lie so much in the “whodoneit” but in the motives. I loved the pacing and characters and Michaelides did an exceptional job in setting an atmospheric tone through location.

A great page turner that was so much fun to read.

Many thanks to NetGalley and Celadon Books for an advance copy in exchange for an honest review.

The Fury is filled with mystery and twists that keep you second guessing everything you think you know until the very end.
In true Michaelides fashion, this book did not disappoint. I wasn't sure what to expect going into it, since the whodunit trope has been overdone so many times but WOW. What a unique way to tell a story. I was completely hooked from page 1.

Thank you for sending me an early of The Fury by Alex Michaelides Netgalley and Celadon. I thoroughly enjoyed the book and found the characters reminiscent of a telenovela. The whodunit plot was well crafted and had a surprising twist, making it one of the best books I've read since The Silent Patient. I highly recommend getting this book released in January.

I loved it! I stayed up late reading and couldn’t put it down. I need to reread all of them now. There’s so much to his characters and when there’s a secret, it’s never what you think it may be. I was so thrilled to receive the ARC and can’t wait for it to be published!

I enjoyed this much more than The Maidens but not as much as The Silent Patient. It was a little slow and drug at times and then resolved very quickly and confusingly at the end.

arc review - They Fury

In The Fury our unreliable narrator tells us role story piece by piece slowly unveiling more and more as the story progresses peeling it back like an onion.

We are all the unreliable narrators of our own lives.

I was so excited to receive this ARC copy of the Fury by Alex Michaelides as he is one of my favorite authors. Immediately I found this book to have much better pacing than the The Silent Patient and The Maidens and rhetorical the Characters were much more impressionable. But he continues to do an amazing job of including classic tragedy in the story.

Which comes first—character or fate? This is the central question in any tragedy. What takes precedence—free will or destiny?

But it’s only fiction, I’m afraid. Real life turned out somewhat differently.

The ending of the story was so captivating I could barely tear my eyes from the pages. With such an unreliable narrator, not a single line could be trusted to be true. But that was the interesting part about what kept you hanging on till the last line and even then wondering if you were getting the truth. And of course I loved the nod to The Silent Patient.