Hello March! Yesterday we met to discuss The 7.5 Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle, by Stuart Turton. Up next for April's selection is The Boys in the Boat, by Daniel James Brown. We have a good handful of copies, but we'd like to
remind our members to please be intentional about reading through the
book club books and returning them to library in as timely a fashion as
possible to help us be as efficient as we can in distributing the copies
we are able to secure~ we appreciate your help! If you do not need
a copy, and you haven't already let us know, would you please leave a
comment below to update us? Thanks so much in advance!
Lastly, we collected the last of the nominations for this year's reading list last night, and we are busy bee's getting them sorted and organized onto the ballot. We'll get the finished ballot out to you most likely by the end of this week, and we'll plan to vote in our next 12 books at the April 8th book club meeting. I believe Susan will also be adding an online voting option for anyone who would prefer to vote that way, or anyone who can't make April's meeting. We'll get the word out when the link it up and running. In the meantime...
To the book!
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...
Evelyn Hardcastle will die every day until Aiden Bishop can identify her killer and break the cycle. But every time the day begins again, Aiden wakes up in the body of a different guest. And some of his hosts are more helpful than others.
This book, for everyone present, was a bust. We could all appreciate the premise, and were intrigued with the alternate concept of the prison system. We liked Turton's character development, and his writing in general, but so many of us were either hopelessly lost, or just surrendered altogether long before the halfway mark. We all agreed the book was a touch predictable, and far too long, with far too many characters and plot lines to try to keep straight. One member counted 42 different characters~ whew. It was said that one could read the first 100 pages, and then skip to the last 100 pages, and be better off than reading the book in its entirety.
In the end, we discussed book nominations and wrapped things up early~ sometimes that's just the way it goes when we are all in agreement about a book, good or bad.
Did you love The 7.5 Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle? Fans of the book also enjoyed, Everyone in My Family Has Killed Someone, by Benjamin Stevenson, How to Solve Your Own Murder, by Kristen Perrin, and The Midnight Feast, by Lucy Foley. All of these titles are available within the Viking Library System~ reserve your copy today!
The votes are in!
Would we recommend this to a friend to read? Unanimously, NO!
Would we
recommend this to another book club for discussion? Again, unanimously, NO!
Rate the
book 1-5 stars, with 1 being the lowest rating: 1.5 stars
