The Hunting Party by Lucy Foley
Written by Ashley Kelmore, Posted in Reviews
Four Stars
Best for:
Fans of the Liane Moriarty style of storytelling, who aren’t worried about slightly darker tales.
In a nutshell:
A bunch of friends of university – along with their partners – spend New Year’s Eve at an isolated lodge in northern Scotland. A storm hits. Someone is dead.
Worth quoting:
N/A
Why I chose it:
I was looking for something to listen to while running. Instead I ended up listening to it while doing pretty much anything because I couldn’t put it down.
Review:
This book has features I love: it travels back and forth in time (though only across three days); it takes place in an isolated location; it is told from multiple viewpoints.
We get five viewpoints in this book: Heather and Doug, who work at the lodge, and Katie, Emma, and Madeline, who are part of the friend group celebrating the holiday at the lodge. Katie and Madeline have been friends since childhood; Emma has joined the group of Oxford alumni as an outsider who is dating Mark. We learn early on that someone has died, but we don’t know who it is (not even their gender) or if it was an accident or murder.
There are hints as to who the dead person is, and any number of possible motives slowly reveal themselves. I had a bit six different theories by the end, and any one of them could have been true based on how the story unfolded.
Within the standard telling of a murder mystery, the author weaves in how relationships from youth change as we get older. There’s one couple with a new baby; two couples with a member who wasn’t part of the original friend group. There are shared stories and histories, and roles people are expected to play because they played that role when they were 21. 12 years later, people might have changed, and that can really play with the dynamics of a group.
This probably was around 3.5 stars for me, but I have rounded it up because I think there was some interesting character exploration and also some legitimate red herrings that kept me guessing until the end.
What’s next for this book:
I’ll be checking out the other books by this author for sure. (I’ve literally already bought the next one.)
