The 7 1/2 Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle

Locations
Call Number: Adult Book / Fiction / Thriller / General / Turton, Stuart, Mystery / Turton, Stuart
On Shelf At: Malletts Creek Branch, Traverwood Branch, Westgate Branch

Location & Checkout Length	Call Number	Checkout Length	Item Status
Malletts Adult Books 4-week checkout	Adult Book / Fiction / Thriller / General / Turton, Stuart	4-week checkout	On Shelf
Traverwood Adult Books 4-week checkout	Adult Book / Fiction / Thriller / General / Turton, Stuart	4-week checkout	On Shelf
Traverwood Adult Books 4-week checkout	Adult Book / Fiction / Thriller / General / Turton, Stuart	4-week checkout	Due 04-24-2024
Westgate Adult Books 4-week checkout	Adult Book / Fiction / Thriller / General / Turton, Stuart	4-week checkout	On Shelf
Westgate Adult Books 4-week checkout	Adult Book / Fiction / Thriller / General / Turton, Stuart	4-week checkout	Due 05-17-2024
Westgate Adult Books 4-week checkout	Adult Book / Fiction / Thriller / General / Turton, Stuart	4-week checkout	Due 05-10-2024
Downtown 2nd Floor 4-week checkout	Mystery / Turton, Stuart	4-week checkout	Due 04-02-2024
Downtown 2nd Floor 4-week checkout	Mystery / Turton, Stuart	4-week checkout	Due 05-08-2024
Pittsfield Adult Books 4-week checkout	Adult Book / Fiction / Thriller / General / Turton, Stuart	4-week checkout	Due 05-22-2024

Doomed to repeat the same day over and over, Aiden Bishop must solve the murder of Evelyn Hardcastle in order to escape the curse in a world filled with enemies where nothing and no one are quite what they seem.

REVIEWS & SUMMARIES

Library Journal Review
Booklist Review
Publishers Weekly Review
Summary / Annotation
Author Notes

COMMUNITY REVIEWS

Creative Concept submitted by abalsmeyer on July 22, 2019, 6:49pm I loved this book- it was really different than any other books I have read so far. It was a bit confusing to keep track of the characters and the chronology of everything, but I absolutely loved it!

Creative and riveting! submitted by jaromatorio on July 24, 2020, 11:42am Let me start by saying-I LOVE a good mystery. The only complaint that I sometimes have with the genre is that the tropes tend to get a bit overdone. That is absolutely not the case here!

‘The Seven and a Half Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle’ opens with the narrator awaking in the woods, having no recollection of how he got there. When he witnesses what appears to be a murder, he rushes to the nearest building he can find for help. He comes upon an old manor house and, after speaking to the inhabitants, discovers that he’s one of several guests expected at a dinner party that’s to take place there that evening. As the day passes, the narrator forges bonds with other attendees and gathers clues about the crime that he believes he witnessed.

This all sounds simple enough, right? WRONG. Rather than progressing through the day in a standard, linear fashion as one would expect, and eventually solving the murder, the narrator (through a series of events that you’ll come to understand as you read) ends up inhabiting the bodies of nearly all of the dinner party attendees as the day starts over and over again (think Groundhog Day)! This non-traditional story line allows you as the reader to experience the day from each of the characters’ unique prospectives and understand the complex web of relationships and social histories that gave rise to the crime at hand.

I really loved this story, and though I was woefully confused at times, the complex nature of the narrative made the final resolution all the more satisfying!

Loved it! submitted by KatieD on August 5, 2021, 6:34pm This book kept me guessing until the very end! It reminded me a lot of "Knives Out" where there are so many different layers to the mystery.

An Iterative Mystery submitted by Meginator on August 21, 2021, 8:18am Content Note: This book has some fatphobia.

This twisty novel is as much a high-speed thriller as it is a murder mystery, with a healthy dose of mind-bending science fiction thrown into the mix for good measure. Turton wrings every bit of possibility out of his premise, with the narrator (and main detective) spending eight days in eight different bodies while attempting to solve the crime. This fact itself becomes part of an even bigger mystery that culminates in a complex philosophical quandary that transcends the murder mystery (which is full of the requisite red herrings and additional twists) entirely. This book relies on several genre conventions yet it is utterly unique; it kept me guessing even when I thought I’d figured it out and I’ve never read anything quite like it.

Not for everyone submitted by terpsichore17 on June 21, 2022, 12:35pm I started this book without reading any of the blurbs, and thus did not know I was following Aiden Bishop through various bodies in a time loop.

Whether that ultimately would have helped is unclear: the premise is certainly a puzzle (who has he been, who will he be? When do they meet? How will he learn the facts he needs to know? Who can he trust? How close is his hunter?), an ingenious intellectual exercise.

But is it gratifying? Not so much.

Typically, when reading a mystery, I appreciate or enjoy the detective at least, even if the murder victim was loved by few and missed by none. Failing that, I look for some kind of amusing speech or diverting descriptions or piercing commentary. This book left me hunting for someone, anyone, that provoked any good feeling, any sympathy, any virtue.

Blackheath is empty of all of these. The underlying reality explains *why,* but we don’t learn that rationale until the end, in a too-little-too-late infodump. Bishop’s expectation of waking up in a new host devalues the life he’s in, so that the pile of bodies accruing by the end has all the weight of felled characters in a video game.

MUST READ submitted by bjkoch on July 15, 2022, 5:59pm cannot recommend this book enough.

Very interesting submitted by zwachtel50 on June 9, 2023, 4:22pm I really liked this book. It was a little slow on the uptake, but the story was so interesting with all the twists and turns. I definitely recommend if you enjoy “sci-fi adjacent” books.

Cool concept submitted by chowcy on June 12, 2023, 8:55pm I could easily see this being made into a movie or TV show. The protagonist needs to solve a murder to escape. He is able to do that because he replays the day multiple times as different characters. Clues accumulate as the book goes on, but after so many characters, it does get hard to keep track of what's happening. There are surprising twists and turns, and some cool (albeit under-developed) world-building near the end, making for an overall satisfying read.