Mystery/Thriller Reading Friends discussion

This is the spoilers welcome topic for our September 2024 Group Read book, The Last Murder at the End of the World by Stuart Turton.
What did you think of the book? Please note how far along in the book you are for comments on this topic.

General thoughts: I liked this book but I was predisposed to because I attended a reading by the author and found him interesting and engaging (also funny). I wish I had take notes because all I remember is it took him a while to come up with an idea that was compelling enough that he wanted to write it. And the storyline of this one is quite the idea!
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Spoilers to the end
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I found this book complicated to sort out -- I listened to it on audio which always is a little harder to unravel complicated plots and lots of characters. He says at the beginnning of the book that he includes the list of characters at someone's request, and I'm glad he did (didn't do that in the audio but I also had a library print copy). Even with it I had a hard time keeping some of the characters straight, particularly the researchers and some of the secondary characters.

I loved the reveal that an AI (or whatever you'd call Abi) was able to speak directly into folks' minds and hear their thoughts. The later reveal that they were following the direction of (forget her name, the murder victim) and would not divert from that path was both intriguing and scary.

The plot was pretty complicated in terms of how they came to be on the island (other than the worldwide pandemic created by the fog), what the researchers were doing, why they made the villagers work in their sleep, why the apprentices who disappeared (including Emery's husband) were kept in a trance and made to work, other plot twists, were hard to follow. I loved the surprise reveal that the villages were not human but... whatever they were. Clones?

I never did get what triggered the creeping of the fog. Was it the simple fact of the murder, or did the murder victim do something to trigger it?

This may merit a re-read sometime, or at least a pretty detailed plot summary. I see Goodreads has plot summaries of many books, but they look like books themselves or maybe articles, and I can't figure out how you get them.

Oh I see, the plot summary is available on Kindle looks like, for $7.95. https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/2...

I enjoyed this and am impressed that he has written such different books and styles. In some aspects it was thought provoking, the idea that clones/genetically altered beings (however you best describe them) could have artistic interests and that they were "born/created" aged 7. What made him choose that age? Why not a fully formed adult? Also the idea that you die at a certain age and celebrate your life the night before was an interesting approach to grief and accepting death.

I look forward to reading what he comes up with next!

Emma wrote: "I enjoyed this and am impressed that he has written such different books and styles. In some aspects it was thought provoking, the idea that clones/genetically altered beings (however you best desc..."

I agree, Emma, that the idea of knowing when you'll die and celebrating that is an interesting approach. It seems like that concept has appeared in other novels but I can't think of where.

I finished today and really enjoyed this. It was a bit complicated and at some points towards the end, I felt that he was trying to wrap too much up into the resolution, so much so that I found myself confused in the twist and turns.

Hephaestus was certainly a conflicted person: he hated humans, asking "How could anybody, in good conscience, save a race that had witnessed the brutality of the fog and then decided to one-up it" but at the same time finds the villagers worthless, they are simply creatures that can be created to work and recreated when needed.

And to know you are going to die at 60? I had too many plans to die that early! But then again, I wasn't stuck on an island. Without books.

Carol: how fun that you got to meet the author, Stuart Turton. I admit to going into the book thinking how could a "locked-room" / "trapped -on-an-island" book be different from others - and it was quite unexpected.

Carol/Bonadie wrote: "General thoughts: I liked this book but I was predisposed to because I attended a reading by the author and found him interesting and engaging (also funny). I wish I had take notes because all I remember is it took him a while to come up with an idea that was compelling enough that he wanted to write it. And the storyline of this one is quite the idea!"

Gail: agreed, I was starting to get confused towards the end and then just decided to go with it and see what happened. If I missed a twist or two, I was ok with that.
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Spoilers to the end of the book: comments on the elders.
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In the end each of the elders had a blind spot to their own arrogance, and hard-held ideas on the rightness of their actions over the last decades. That hubris led to the situation they found themselves in with each having diametrically opposed positions on the best actions going forward.
My take on it was that in the end Niema was the more enlightened elder, perhaps only because of her own culpability in the first place gave her further to grow. Niema seemed to be trying to free the villagers from their ignorance of the situation and less, not much less, but less barbaric than the completely unfeeling Hephaestus. Hephaestus was quite conflicted though as you mentioned.
Thea's culpability was less clear to me; the secrets the three elders kept even from each other got a bit muddy between Niema and Thea. It seemed they all knew the 'missing' scientist villagers were 'alive' and working on tunneling into the earth among other things.

Gail W wrote: "I finished today and really enjoyed this. It was a bit complicated and at some points towards the end, I felt that he was trying to wrap too much up into the resolution, so much so that I found myself confused in the twist and turns..."

Emma: I think your comments are spot-on for noting the depth of the plot of the story - the approach to grief from different directions was brilliant and while subtle, very impactful. The slow reveal of the background of the island's inhabitants' existence was very well done, including the unusual starting and ending points of their lives.
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Mild spoilers to the end:
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Life from age 8 to 60, then not just retirement, but an easy death is not something a robust healthy 59-year-old would normally embrace. It seemed the mind-control that bred in compliance was stronger in some villagers more than others.

Emma wrote: "I enjoyed this and am impressed that he has written such different books and styles. In some aspects it was thought provoking, the idea that clones/genetically altered beings (however you best describe them) could have artistic interests and that they were "born/created" aged 7.
What made him choose that age? Why not a fully formed adult? Also the idea that you die at a certain age and celebrate your life the night before was an interesting approach to grief and accepting death..."

Carol: My response to your fog question / comment and I agree, the reveal of what was going on with the villagers was a pleasant surprise.
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Spoiler to the end
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The fog 'count-down' seemed to be related to a prevention mechanism that was turned off at some point. Was it Abi or Niema, I'm not sure. The actions of those two got the most muddied up in my mind during the planning of the challenge. Niema, I think was the one who was aware of the villager's immunity to the insects in the fog since she was hiding that Jack (Emory's husband) and the others were actually alive and toiling away like slaves in the Blackheath closed off tunnels.

Carol/Bonadie wrote: "The plot was pretty complicated in terms of how they came to be on the island (other than the worldwide pandemic created by the fog), what the researchers were doing, why they made the villagers work in their sleep, why the apprentices who disappeared (including Emery's husband) were kept in a trance and made to work, other plot twists, were hard to follow. I loved the surprise reveal that the villages were not human but... whatever they were. Clones?

I never did get what triggered the creeping of the fog. Was it the simple fact of the murder, or did the murder victim do something to trigger it?"

General thoughts.
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Spoilers to the end - characters and a summary.
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As for other characters, the diversity of the villagers' awareness of the situation was on display in the generations of one villager family:
- Clara, daughter to Emory
- Emory, daughter to Seth
- Seth son of Matis- and Matis, father to Seth, grandfather to Emory, great-grandfather to Clara.
Each had a quite different level of acceptance, curiosity and intelligence that in full knowledge of the process that created them all shows the refinement and evolution of that process Niema employed.
Their emotions and interpersonal relationships belie the clone / drone label.
Emory's focus makes you wonder what the elders really thought of her abilities when they weren't afraid of her finding them out.

And then there is Abi - the artificial intelligence often driving the omnipresent narration; in the villagers' and elders' heads, and in different capacities showing that AI - given a mission - is unrelenting in that pursuit. Food for thought delivered in a fast-moving thriller-ride of a reveal. In retrospect, I may up my rating from 4 to 5 stars.

Ann wrote: "And then there is Abi - the artificial intelligence often driving the omnipresent narration; in the villagers' and elders' heads, and in different capacities showing that AI - given a mission - is unrelenting in that pursuit. Food for thought delivered in a fast-moving thriller-ride of a reveal..."

Yes, this seems to be a common theme in stories about AI, from Hal in 2001:A Space Odyssey to Ava in Ex Machina, both excellent movies.

I enjoyed the novel very much, so much, I read it almost straight through in two days!

Niema held all of the secrets about every mystery. She obviously did some evolving herself!

aPriL,
mild sppoilers
interesting to consider that Niema did hold all the secrets - a good point; and it seems it was Niema's evolving that drove the jump-start out of stasis. She was not necessarily liked, but she was looking out for the villagers (finally). The evolving generations villagers might have continued to push for awareness just by their changing natures, but that would have taken a good while and could have been quashed without Niema.

aPriL does feral sometimes wrote: "I enjoyed the novel very much, so much, I read it almost straight through in two days!

Niema held all of the secrets about every mystery. She obviously did some evolving herself!"