Thanks to NetGalley and HarperCollins for the ARC!

My opinions are my own.

I've read most of Lucy Foley's books as I'm an Agatha Christie fan and her novels are right up my alley. This one reminded me of a mix of Christie's novels: "The Pale Horse," "Endless Night" and "Dead Man's Folly" all rolled into one.

The premise is a posh "Goopy yoga princess" (Francesca Meadows) who opens a wellness retreat out in the country in a rustic town in Dorset, along the Southwest coast of England where the locals don't appreciate her, for good reason. In the present timeline, she's preparing for the opening weekend festivities while trying desperately to squash all the ghosts of the past. We come to learn of her past transgressions and those of her grandparents as the story unfolds. There's a heavy integration of the supernatural and pagan lore of the locals of the area that is brought into the story.

Francesca, as a teenager collected "townies-of-the-month" (think "Saltburn") in a bid to feel good a

Another incredibly immersive and addictive book from Lucey Foley. She’s honestly become a bit of an auto buy for me. This book follows the development of an estate house into a super high end and exclusive hotel, to be run by its heiress, who has clearly got a bit of a past. Unfortunately, its development is coming at the expense of the local community, creating deep resentment across generations.

We get several POVs as the story develops: the heiress, a dishwasher who works at the kitchen, an old acquaintance of the heiress, the architect and recent husband of the heiress, and the investigator sent to check out the deadly aftermath of the bacchanal.

The friction between the community and the estate comes to a head, as all four central characters as well as some of the side characters have more of a shared past than they realize.

I absolutely couldn’t put this one down. As things start to go wrong on opening weekend, and the heiress begins to spiral, she also begins to question whether the local legend of the Birds are affecting her grand plans. If you like unreliable narrators, a good-for-them ending, compelling characters, and a fiery dénouement, I’d recommend this whole heartedly.

It may feel like there’s some magical realism happening here, but if that’s not your vibe, please know in the end that that’s not how this resolves.

The one element that didn’t quite hit for me was the investigator’s POV. Foley was working very hard to keep the reader from knowing who had fallen to their death, for good reason in the end, but as I was reading it in real time, it felt a bit tortured to keep from describing the scene. A very small quibble in an otherwise super fun read.

Many thanks to Netgalley and William Morrow Books for I an advance copy!!

The Midnight Feast by Lucy Foley is a dark, scenic thriller told by alternating narrators and through a shifting timeline. I requested this one from NetGalley because I have really enjoyed some of Lucy Foley's previous books (The Guest List in particular).

First, let me start with the things that I enjoyed about this book. It is atmospheric and has a strong sense of place. There were several little shocks and twists that kept me guessing. And at the end, I was satisfied as a reader with the conclusion. I also enjoyed flipping between the "present-day" after the solstice, the days leading up to the solstice, and the distant past.

What didn't work as well for me is that many of the characters are unlikable or boring. Francesca and the twins had no redeeming qualities and I had a hard time keeping up with who was who. I found the whole story to be unbelievable and the first portion of the book moved really slowly.

Overall, I think the book is a perfectly fine thriller. It's the kind of book I would say take on the airplane or read on the beach. It will go down quick and you won't remember much about it in a few days.

I was SO excited when I saw I got approved for this ARC from NetGalley! 🥳💃🏻 This was hands down my favorite book by Lucy Foley!! I couldn’t focus on anything until I finished this because I was dying to know what happened next. Every character made you wonder what they were hiding and the twists at the end had me in absolute shock 🤯

Big thanks to @netgalley and @williammorrowbooks for the ARC!! This thriller will be released on June 18th 😍

4/5 ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

#lucyfoley #themidnightfeast #suspense #mystery #thriller #newrelease #arc #netgalley

The Manor hotel has opened on the Dorset coastline. It’s a luxurious wellness hotel owned by Francesca Meadows. It is a place to relax, be pampered, and enjoy the beautiful setting. What guests don't know is that the manor has an ugly past. The guests may be in the dark, but there are those who know, those who have been watching, waiting, and planning. Soon old friends, old secrets, and old enemies will collide at the luxury hotel.

I had such high hopes for this book. I was intrigued by the synopsis: a manor, the woods, the secrets. I just knew I was going to love it. But sadly, this one didn't work for me. I did enjoy the journal entries which gave glimpses into the past and showed the characters as teenagers. There are a lot of characters with various motivations and their connections to the past. Then there are the birds. Francesca is told that she needs to keep them happy. What happens when the birds are not kept happy?

The book is told through various characters POV's (5 in total). I didn't mind this and we got their thoughts and motivations. Sadly, I only cared about Eddie, all the other characters fell flat for me. He was the only sympathetic character in the book for me.

Then there are the birds and the black feathers being found at the hotel. I wish this would have been explored and utilized more in the book. This element piqued my interest and I found this to be a nice touch and a nod to the local lore.

I enjoyed the atmosphere and the tension in the book. I thought these were nicely done. I also enjoyed watching as characters began to show their true colors.

I really wanted to love this one, but it just didn't work for this reader. I can't fault the writing or the premise. Lucy Foley is a great writer and I look forward to reading more of her books in the future.

Others enjoyed this book more than I did so please read their reviews as well. We can't love them all and that is the case with this book.



Thank you to William Morrow and NetGalley who provided me with a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. All the thoughts and opinions are my own.

This book took me a little longer to read than I had anticipated, but that is not due to the story. The book was captivating, but I started it at a very busy time and kept having to put it on the backburner. Fortunately, the story was so strong and the characters so well-developed that it stayed with me so that I could easily pick back up where I left off each time.
The Midnight Feast is a stunning story that centers around the secrets of The Manor, a spacious and luxurious resort with a dark and twisty backstory and its big opening weekend culminating during the Solstice celebration. Throughout the story we meet the founder of the establishment, her talented architect husband, a mystery guest who booked to stay with dubious intentions, and the kitchen help. All have secret motives and mysterious pasts. By the end of the weekend, someone is dead - but who? And why? You're going to want to read to find out. It's juicy, it's tantalizing and will keep you guessing throughout.
Thank you to NetGalley and William Morrow for this fantastic read. Look for this book when it comes out on June 18th, 2024. This one is not to be missed.

I hate to say this, but this is Lucy Foley's worst novel. Usually I find her thrillers entertaining and easy enough to read that it's enjoyable but not a chore, but this one was just not good. Similar to her other novels, this is told from multiple POVs - which works great in thrillers - but then she also included weird flashback/diary chapters that really chopped up the story. It was hard to like any of the characters, too. The plot was just weird and all over the place throughout the entire novel. All of the bird stuff was very bizarre, and the twist was pretty ridiculous as well, in my opinion. This had the potential to be intriguing and creepy, but it just didn't hit right. I'll still probably pick up Foley's next novel, but this one was a miss for me.

Thanks to NetGalley and William Morrow for this ARC.

Boo. The books I’ve liked from this author have all been of the group-of-people-gathered-at-remote-location-plus-murder genre. And they were all really good, weren’t they? That’s why I was excited to get this early from NetGalley.

Here we have opening weekend of a bougie resort in the woods. The main characters are the owner, the architect (also owner’s husband), an employee, and a guest. Plus the townies who dislike having a bougie resort in town.

Too much time spent wondering what the point was here. Like, halfway through the book I realized nothing had really happened… and that just continued.

It was bad! The characters sucked, I didn’t care what happened to them, the timeline was a bit confusing, and then in the end it’s a big bowl of Who Gives A Shit. I will forget this book within the hour.

Boo.

All of Lucy Foley's books have been a great and suspensful read. The Midnight Feast, went above my expectations. You want a book that will lure you in quick and keep you to the last page.

Wow. I found The Midnight Feast to be entertaining, plot driven and just weird. You are immediately taken to the English seaside to enjoy the opening of an exclusive retreat for special guests only during the summer solstice. Right away a local finds a body at the bottom of one of the cliffs while the manor just on the cliff above is ignited in flames. This story holds multiple character perspectives over multiple timelines however I found it easy to follow. This story was thrilling and gripping and I was not thoroughly prepared for all of the twists and turns. Although a couple of the twists were predictable, my jaw was on the ground during the final chapters into the epilogue.
There is some inclusion of what I would consider folklore in the aspects of the local legends of The Birds. This is where things got weird (in a good way). I felt the mystery of the Birds perfectly integrated into the main storyline and by the end everything seemed to satisfyingly unravel.
This is a little different than the things I normally read and felt pleasantly surprised that I enjoyed it.

Thank you Lucey Foley, William Morrow and NetGalley for the ARC in exchange for an honest review.

3.5/5 stars. Lucy Foley is one of my favorite thriller authors, and I was so pumped to receive the arc for her newest. The Midnight Feast has an entirely different vibe from her other books with the addition of a local cult and urban myths. I found the beginning to be pretty confusing and not very captivating (the diary entries were especially hard to get through because of the writing style), but at about 60% in things start to come together and I couldn’t put it down. I love how the ending comes full circle and all the little sporadic details from the beginning connect to one another. This wasn’t my favorite Lucy Foley thriller, but it was still really entertaining and tense. Thank you NetGalley and William Morrow for the arc!

I look forward to every Lucy Foley book that comes out - this one was no different! I really, really enjoyed this book. It's one of the better books I have read this year! I thought that the connected stories were incredibly interesting and loved how it all came together at the end. I thought that the Birds were a fun, creepy add that kept me wondering/guessing until the end. Thanks so much William Morrow and NetGalley for the ARC!

If you have read any of Lucy Foley's previous books - The Guest List; Paris Apartment and the Hunting Party you will like her newest. I won't go into the plot, however it is the story of a rich girl coming back to her family's estate and the relationships she had with the "poor" townspeople when they were teenagers. I felt the premise and characters were a bit farfetched and wasn't easy to know exactly who was who. I had to re-read a few chapters. That said I had to keep reading! I think I enjoyed her other books more than this one - I gave the Guest List and Paris Apartment 5 stars and the Hunting Party 4 stars and the Midnight Feast 4 stars.
Thank you NetGalley and William Morrow for the opportunity to read an ARC copy of this book for an honest review.

Many thanks to NetGalley for granting me an early release of The Midnight Feast written by Lucy Foley, an author whose books I've been reading and enjoying for the last few years. I absolutely loved The Guest List! This was a tough read. I enjoyed many parts of it, but it was also filled with double identities, weird scenes that didn't seem to connect to anything else, and a frequent expectation to accept that people wouldn't recognize others from the past. Toss in a failure to explain a lot of situations in the end, and I found myself struggling to want to know what happened. There were too many changes in POV, and a diary that was written in teenage drama language, making it pull readers from the story too often.

I love a Lucy book. this one was good but didn't hit like the others ones I have read . still enjoyable however i didn't really care for going back and forth between so many characters. also some of the verbiage . but intriguing plot and i love a creepy manor but its okay.

This book is about opening weekend at the Manor. A luxury resort. it is told from several points of view. It will keep you guessing until the end,

4 1/2 stars! I really like this one and I want to reread it but It won't go down as one of my favorites. Ive read only one other Lucy Foley book. I read the hunting party a while back. I didn't hate it but I didn't love it. This one I enjoyed a lot more.
This is such a good summer read. I was so interested in each character. The chapters change perspective and character and it creates this full picture that really shows the setting from all points of view. I was thoroughly invested in each characters storyline and I really enjoyed how they all came together in the end. I feel like I was given enough of the puzzle pieces and the story really flowed well. Sometimes with past/present narrative one could be a little more boring than the other but both timelines were super interesting and had so much development I was invested! Would definitely recommend this as a fun summer read.

I really like Lucy Foley books and this was interesting but very different. I understand the premise and what happened but it seemed rushed to me but at the same time too long. I dont know but maybe this one just wasn't for me. I gave this book a 4/5 the writing was very descriptive which I always love. I just dont know why it didn't capture me as much maybe I just didn't vibe with the characters as much as i usually do.

This was not my favorite book from Lucy Foley! I typically love her books, because they have you on the edge of your seat dying to find out what happens. Midnight Feast was intriguing at parts, but it didn’t have me completely hooked. It was little darker than what I typically gravitate towards. Ultimately, the story (from all different perspectives and multiple timelines) did come together which made for a satisfying ending.

Multiple POVs and timelines; involves small town folklore; a mix between Midsommar, Yellowjackets, and The White Lotus; slow to start, and some scenes were kind of boring, but as it continued I became more intrigued - a great build up of puzzle pieces that slowly come together; full of twists and turns; a lot of suspense and tension that
kept me hooked.

Special thank you to William Morrow and Netgalley for a DRC of this book in exchange for an honest review.