The Last Party

[cornerofmadness]

The Last Party by Clare Mackintosh

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


thanks to Netgalley for this arc (which in no way influenced my review). This is a 3.5 read for me but I rounded up because I did enjoy it and it made me want to go back to Wales again. I loved the little Welsh phrases tossed in and yes the divide between England and Wales isn't just in our two DCIs but it a main theme (and motivator) for the crime. The main problem for me is it's a touch slow because it bounces from the past to present and through multiple main characters which is a tad much.

Rhys Lloyd is a wealthy singer on the decline, a hometown star of Cwm Coed a small Welsh village on the shores of a lake in the shadow of the dragon (Pen y Ddraig mountain). He has broken his father's trust by not keeping the lake wild and Welsh when he inherited the land and instead moved his wife and twin daughters there into the brand new McMansion town houses for the rich and famous (Mostly from England). He claims he wanted to build an artist colony but he merely built it for elitists including his business partner/money man, Jonty, a retired widow (with a past), a boxer turned actor and his influencer wife, and a mom with a son she wants to keep out of prison even if she can't afford the place.

Rhys is taken out New Year's Eve and everyone in The Shores has motive as does most of Cwm Coed between them being angry about the influx of wealthy Englishmen who won't even patronize the local shops and we slowly learn Rhys is not a good man.

Investigating the case is Ffion Morgan (Ffion Wyllt which is Welsh for Wild Ffion) and Leo who is from right across the English border and just so happens to be someone she met for some new year's eve fun which makes working together awkward. What annoyed me at first was the less than professional doings from Ffion who is the main character of this series (we learn why in the part two but until then it tarnished my view of her) Ffion lives with her Mam and much younger sister after leaving her husband Huw (a contractor for the Shores and a suspect in Rhys's murder)

Leo is also fighting personal battles both with a racist boss and trying not to lose complete access to his son (His wife is divorced and with another man and is not above lying to child protective services etc to get her way) So yeah there is SO much going on in this novel especially since this seems to be the opening of a series (whether or not we'll see Leo again is questionable as Ffion is the series titular character).

As far as a mystery goes, it does work and it was engaging. Yes maybe we didn't need 1001 points of view (there is a whole other side plot of Seren, Ffion's young sibling, hanging with the teenaged boy one step from prison and Rhys's twin daughters but there were reasons for it's hard to say if it needed to go but there were pacing issues. ) I'd definitely get the next book in the series.




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