07/09/2018
Turton’s complex debut blends mystery with Groundhog Day and Quantum Leap. Guests have been invited to the Hardcastle family manse, the dilapidated Blackheath House in the English countryside, for a masquerade ball that the Hardcastles are holding for the return of their daughter, Evelyn, from Paris. At the novel’s start, several days before the ball, an unnamed protagonist comes upon Blackheath and enlists those inside to find the body of a woman he thinks has just been murdered. He’s forgotten his identity, but people at the house think he’s Dr. Sebastian Bell, an invitee to the ball. It turns out Bell is the first of eight people—invited guests of the Hardcastles, their associates, staff, and a police officer—whom the main character will inhabit over eight days in a repeating loop. This loop revolves around two mysteries: who killed young Thomas Hardcastle 19 years ago, and who murders Evelyn, his older sister, the night of the ball? As the hero amasses clues about the past and present, a mysterious costumed “Plague Doctor” chimes in to direct the action, explaining the only escape from this loop is to expose the identity of Evelyn’s murderer. This is a complicated, twisting plot that may delight some looking for a puzzle but may leave others exasperated at the overly abstruse rules and kitchen-sink concept. (Sept.)
"Dazzling. A revolving door of suspects (and narrators); a sumptuous country-house setting; a pure-silk Möbius strip of a story. This bracingly original, fiendishly clever murder mystery - Agatha Christie meets Groundhog Day - is quite unlike anything I've ever read, and altogether triumphant. I wish I'd written it." - A. J. Finn, #1 New York Times-bestselling author of The Woman in the Window
"This book blew my mind! Utterly original and unique." - International bestseller Sophie Hannah
"I hereby declare Stuart Turton the Mad Hatter of Crime. The 7½ Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle is unique, energizing, and clever. So original, a brilliant read." - Ali Land, Sunday Times bestselling author Good Me Bad Me
"If Agatha Christie and Terry Pratchett had ever had LSD-fuelled sex, then The 7½ Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle would be their acid trip book baby. Darkly comic, mind-blowingly twisty, and with a cast of fantastically odd characters, this is a locked room mystery like no other." - Sarah Pinborough, New York Times bestselling author
"Agatha Christie meets Downton Abbey with a splash of red wine and Twin Peaks. Dark and twisty, lush and riddled with gorgeous prose, part of me will always be trapped in Blackheath." - Delilah S. Dawson, New York Times bestselling author
"A kaleidoscopic mystery that brilliantly bends the limits of the genre and the mind of the reader. The7½ Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastleisurgent, inventive, creepy and, above all, a blastto read!" - Matthew Sullivan, author of Midnight at the Bright Ideas Bookstore
"Brilliant, brilliant, brilliant! It's a work of sheer genius. An amazing, unique book that blew my mind." - Sarah J. Harris, author of The Color of Bee Larkham's Murder
"This novel is so ingenious and original that it's difficult to believe it's Turton's debut. The writing is completely immersive...there are certainly echoes of Agatha Christie here, but it's Christie ramped up several notches, thanks to the malevolent twist on the Groundhog Day theme. Readers may be scratching their heads in delicious befuddlement as they work their way through this novel, but one thing will be absolutely clear: Stuart Turton is an author to remember." - Booklist
"Gloriously inventive, playful and clever, this is a must for mystery fans. I wish I'd written it myself..." - Robin Stevens, author of the Wells and Wong mystery series
"Stuart Turton's debut novel is dazzling in its complexity, astonishing in its fiendishness, and shocking in its sheer audacity. Every page, every character, and every deliciously dark secret is an absolute treat. Turton is going places." - Anna Stephens, author of The Godblind Trilogy
"Audaciously inventive, gripping, and original." - Louise O'Neill, author ofOnly Ever YoursandAsking For It
"I'm green with envy; I wish I'd written this book" - Jenny Blackhurst, author ofHow I Lost You
"Absolute envy-making bloody murderous brilliance" - Natasha Pulley, author of The Watchmaker of Filigree Street
"This book had me mesmerized from the very first page to the last. A totally unique premise and a beautifully plotted tale told with breathtaking skill. One of the best books I've read in a long time. Every page either sparkles or fizzes with beauty or danger. This is a real mind-melter of a novel from a writer who has complete mastery over his work. If more people could write like this, who'd need cinema?" - Imran Mahmood, author of You Don't Know Me
"Pop your favorite Agatha Christie whodunnit into a blender with a scoop of Downton Abbey, a dash of Quantum Leap, and a liberal sprinkling of Groundhog's Day and you'll get this unique murder mystery. The twisting, cleverly-written debut..." - Harper's Bazaar, 10 New Books to Add to Your Reading List in 2018
"Atmospheric and unique, this is a mystery that adds "Who am I?" to the question of whodunit, with existentially suspenseful results." - Foreword
04/15/2018
In this creepy, twisty, much-anticipated thriller, Evelyn Hardcastle is murdered each day at 11:00 p.m., and protagonist Aiden Bishop is ordered to inhabit the bodies of eight different guests at the event where they're present so that he can identify the killer and break the bloody cycle. Must-read kudos from Stylist Magazine, Harper's Bazaar, and Australia's Marie Claire; from debut British author Turton.
2018-07-02
In this dizzying literary puzzle, the hapless protagonist is doomed to relive the same day over and over unless he can solve a murder at a masquerade ball.The narrator, Aiden Bishop, wakes up in a forest outside Blackheath House, "a sprawling Georgian manor house," not knowing who or where he is—or why he's screaming the name Anna. A man in a beaked plague-doctor mask brings him up to speed: For eight days, Aiden will wake up in the body of a different witness to the shooting of young beauty Evelyn Hardcastle. If at the end of that extended week, during which Aiden will remember all that occurs, he fails to identify the killer and break the bizarre murder cycle, he will have his memory wiped and be forced to start from the beginning. "It's like I've been asked to dig a hole with a shovel made of sparrows," Aiden moans. To be real or not to be real, that is the question for Aiden, who struggles after his own identity while being "hosted" by individuals who include the lord of the manor, a doctor, and a butler. Borrowing liberally from such cultural milestones as Groundhog Day, Quantum Leap, and Eyes Wide Shut—and, of course, the stories of Agatha Christie—the book has a built-in audience. It's a fiendishly clever and amusing novel with explosive surprises, though in the absence of genuine feeling, it tends to keep its audience at arm's length.Turton's debut is a brainy, action-filled sendup of the classic mystery, though readers may be hard-pressed to keep up with all its keenly calibrated twists and turns for more than 400 pages.
Narrator James Cameron Stewart portrays a large cast of characters in this elaborately plotted mystery set at a crumbling British manor. Each day, the protagonist wakes up in a new body, doomed to repeat the day until he identifies the murderer of Evelyn Hardcastle, a young heiress who dies during a ball at the end of the day. Stewart’s task is not easy: He must create eight memorable characters, all men, while maintaining some consistency for the protagonist’s interior voice. His female voices lack the ease and fluidity of the male ones and veer into a distracting falsetto. But, overall, he excels, using accents, intonation, and more to differentiate the hosts and guide the listener through the complicated plot. E.C. © AudioFile 2018, Portland, Maine
