Ella and her mentor, Molly, are both political activists and close friends. So when Ella appears with a dead man and a tepid story about what happened, Molly helps her hide the body without question. It is only later that Molly realizes she needs to find out the truth about what happened - and quickly, as her own life is now at stake.

We experience the story through both Ella and Molly’s POVs. I was immediately drawn to Molly, an older activist who is looking toward her future and finding it grim. Molly’s motivations are simple, she has beliefs and she stands for them, even at the risk of being arrested or assaulted. Ella is a much more complicated, murky character. As we glimpse flashbacks into these women’s lives, twists and turns are revealed. Ella’s storyline was at times confusing to follow, but the last few chapters made everything shockingly clear.

Thanks to Bloomsbury and Netgalley for an ARC.

A psychological thriller about a community activist, finding herself with a death on her hands that she claims is self-defense to her good friend Molly. Molly and Ella try and cover up the crime and deal with the aftermath. After the body is discovered, and questioning begins, both women begin to doubt the other's story. In the end, both of their lives change forever over this one event.

I am in the minority here. I didn't love this book, as much as I wanted to, because I'd heard such great things about it. I didn't like the writing style. It's told from both Molly and Ella's perspectives, and alternating between past and present. The transitions were confusing and abrupt. I struggled to connect with or care about either Molly or Ella. Rereading the blurb of the book, I am not sure that it is a fair description of the book. Slowly paced, with much time spent on the past caused me to lose interest occasionally.

The one amazing part of this book for me was the ending. It was shocking and I loved it! No spoilers here, but I thought the characters received their due.

I received a copy from the publisher on NetGalley for an honest review.

With an ending that comes out of nowhere, This Is How It Ends is a psychological thriller that could have just been like any other. This is the store of a building women that live there. Ella calls Molly...because she find herself with the body of a dead man. Molly helps Ella cover up the scene, ditch the body in a building that has been so important to them both.

This could have been a book about the community fighting to save a building but as mentioned, it's so much more.

Thanks to NetGalley for the opportunity to read and review this book.

2 1/2 Stars
Unfortunately every book isn’t the perfect fit and this one didn’t work for me. This book was a bit tedious to get through and one that I really didn’t enjoy. It did pick up near the very end, making the last few chapters much more interesting. If only the whole book would have been like those few chapters!

This Is How It Ends by Eva Dolan is a psychological thriller. The story is told from alternating the prospective between Ella and Molly and also flashing back into the past to the events leading up to where the book begins.

As it starts off Ella has called her friend Molly to help her when after her party she finds herself with the body of a dead man. Ella claims to have been attacked and only defended herself but of course Molly doesn’t trust the police and offers to help Ella cover up the crime by ditching the body in the almost abandoned building they had been fighting to save.

The book then begins changing between the two ladies as it goes back to show how they had met and the campaign to save the building in which Molly lives. But it also has chapters in the current time after the murder in which Molly begins to question Ella’s story of just what happened that night.

I have to say that it seems when I was finished that I really seem to be in the minority on this book but unfortunately I just didn’t end up liking it much at all. My biggest problem started off when I just didn’t really care or connect to either Ella or Molly although I will say I liked Molly a bit more. But with not really connecting to either main character it just seemed to make everything that came after drag at a snail’s pace and I found it easy to put this one to the side which is rare for me.

The idea of fighting for the low income against the rich might have been intriguing if I could get behind the characters but instead I just didn’t find it interesting at all and couldn’t find it in me to care about the details to how Ella ended up with a dead man, I was more thinking oh just arrest them all so I can move onto my next read. So needless to say this one just wasn’t my cup of tea although the majority of reviewers do seem to love this one.

I received an advance copy from the publisher via NetGalley.

This certainly starts out very slowly for a thriller. One of the two main characters says that the Victim attacked her and his death was self defense. This not a edge-of-your-seat beginning. It is, however, puzzling because why not try to get help?

From the 3% mark on my kindle forward, the f word come into play quite often as a both a curse word and an act. The two female characters don't seem to really put any stock into building caring relationships, and it shows. I gave up on the book by the time I got to the 20%. I really didn't care for any of the people in this book.

I'm giving it the benefit of the doubt by rating it as three star book. Maybe things pick up, I don't know.

Terrific premise! Sadly I did not like Emma, the main character. She spends a lot of the book worrying about others feeling that she is a poser, a girl from a police family rebelling against her parents through her protesting. And to me, that is exactly what she felt like. I couldn't get past that and sadly, this was really required to fully appreciate the story Ms. Dolan presented. My other problem was the dual timelines. I have no problem bouncing back and forth but with one of the timelines moving backwards, I spent too much mental brainpower trying to remind myself where in the storyline I was instead of just enjoying the ride. These two issues kept me from being engrossed in what was otherwise a very interesting story line about a man's death at a protect party. Heck, I even guessed wrong twice about who the dead man was!

I gave up. I just couldn't get into it though I really tried.

Ella is an activist. All over London affordable housing is being torn down to build expensive high rises. She and her friend Molly are staying in one of the buildings set for demolition along with a few other hold outs. Ella is writing a book on the subject. A party is held to celebrate the book and during the party, Ella accidently? kills a man. Molly helps her clean up and get rid of the body.

In the meantime we go back and forth between the past and the present. I understand the past is for background but I don't really like Ella and when that happens, I lose interest. I gave up 48% (according to my kindle). I may pop ahead to find out who the dead man is, but other than that, I don't really care.

I enjoyed this book, although it was a bit slow to develop. I liked reading from both of the women's perspectives as the story progressed. I thought it was a unique and effective strategy for the author to choose to develop the plotline in both a forward and backward direction. Although I won't be able to adopt this book into a unit for my students because of the dark content, I would recommend it to mature and experienced readers, particularly related to a unit on social justice issues.

This book is definitely a good read, not the best I've read, but worth reading. The author makes sure to cleverly build the characters and develop them and the story and plot in a way that will keep the readers flipping pages, so they know what is going on. A bit intense, but I love intense. Great read.

2.5/5 I was never able to fully connect with this book- not with the characters, the plot, the setting... it was all a bit bland for me. The story was told with some chapters in the past and some in the present alternating between the two main characters. I've read many books where this kind of storytelling works, but I found it to be disjointing and somewhat confusing in this book. Overall, not my cup of tea.

I am on the fence about this one. I got an advanced copy from Netgalley was excited to read it based on the description but I felt like the book felt a little flat to me. I couldn't get into the characters and while I did find myself getting into the story as it went along, it was as fulfilling as I thought it could have been. The second half was definitely better than the first in my opinion. I did like that it was a little different than your typical mystery novel and I liked that it was told from both Molly and Ella's perspectives. I could go either way on this one but feel like it's a solid 2.5/3 stars for me.

This is How it Ends by Eva Dolan

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Out March 13th!

This is How it Ends! The title of this book is so fitting, because once I got to the end, I could not stop reading! Ella and Molly are activists, working to help people stay in their homes as developers close in on the community, pushing people out and driving housing prices up in their wake. One night, during an event at Castle Rise, a building whose resident count is dwindling, Ella calls Molly in a panic. When Molly arrives, she finds Ella in one of the residences, but she is not alone. The dead body on the floor needs to be taken care of, and Molly is just the person to help!

More of a mystery of motives than a “whodunit,” Eva Dolan did such a great job of revealing information at just the right times. The story was told through the eyes of both Molly and Ella as the chapters continued, as many books are. But what was unique about this book in particular was that Molly’s story was told in forward motion, while Ella’s was told in reverse, moving backward through time to reveal a history the reader could not imagine. Only when the author stated “This is How it Ends” did their stories realign, and move forward in parallel until the truth was revealed.

Would highly recommend to all my murder mystery lovers out there. Loved the fresh perspective.

-This book was gifted to me in exchange for an honest review. Thank you to NetGalley, Eva Dolan, and Bloomsbury USA for the opportunity to review.-

3.5 stars
This starts as a book about taking on the system, about the little guys and gals railing against the system. A housing project in London is due to be destroyed to make way for luxury housing. Ella, a young blogger and anti-gentrification activist, is trying to fight the proposed project and help the six remaining owners. Molly is another more long term activist. One night, at a party for Ella’s upcoming book, there’s a death and Molly and Ella cover it up. I didn’t buy into their reasoning for doing so.

The book is told from each woman’s POV, and also from before and after the night of the party. I struggled with Ella, even the Ella of before the cover up. Flip side, I was sympathetic to Molly. Maybe because she’s closer to my age, but I appreciated all she’d given up through the years to be an activist and what those choices had now cost her. As an American, some of the protests named as part of Molly’s history were unknown to me and I had to google them to see if they were real. They are.

This was an interesting premise for me. Because it’s not a clear cut fight. The building in question is old, “ a toad of a building”, with “the smell of mold and rot”. It wasn’t a building that called out to be saved. And with only six families remaining of 300, it seemed more a fight for the sake of a fight than one designed to really change anything.

Now, I was reading an advance copy so I’m not sure if this is intentional or not. Was there a message in the lack of capitalization of some, but not all, formal names and the first word in many, but not all, sentences?

There is a huge twist at the end that I didn’t see coming. In fact, the ending was worth a half, if not a full, star. Because up until then, this book wasn’t really drawing me in.

My thanks to netgalley and Bloomsbury USA for an advance copy of this book.

This Is How it Ends by Eva Dolan is a psychological thriller that will keep you entertained thru the whole book.

Our two main characters are Ella and Molly. The story begins with a murder. And since that point, Ella's story goes backward, telling us about her past, her history and takes us to the very beginning, an incident that changed Ella's life forever and turned her into the girl she is today. Molly's story tells us how the events have proceeded after the murder and how it eventually ended.

Ella, an activist for a lower class community, finds herself face to face with her enemy that has changed her life. In the result, the man is dead on the floor of the apartment building she works so hard to save. Her life came crushing two years ago, that's when Ella realized that law enforcement is not as safe and luxurious as her father made it seem. But Ella finds another way to help people. Ella's momentum to rise and become a voice for her community begins when she meets Molly. They work so hard for their cause, but the dead man can ruin it all for her. The only person Ella can turn to is Molly.

Molly has done some unspeakable things in her life, one of which was attacking a cop with a hammer, he survived an attack. But she never killed. The fear in Ella's eyes convinces Molly to help the poor girl to hide the body. Since that day, Molly tries to convince herself that what she did was a right decision. Then why is her consciousness is troubling her? And why she has a strong feeling that her protege didn't tell the whole truth?

Ella and Molly's stories are very captivating. But the best part is the beginning. The author just throws the murder at us in the first chapter. Boom, this is how it begins. I love books with this type of beginning. After the first chapter, I was not able to get enough of this book. However, it slowed down sometime in the middle, closer to the end. And just when I was about to lose my interest - boom, scandalous twist, followed by an unforeseen ending. Bravo Eva Dolan!!!

This is How it Ends is so well written, such a timely story. It is told from two different perspectives, Ella and Molly, both who are activists. It took me a bit to get into the story, not long mind you , but when I did , the pages flew by. It is a timely suspense book and I didn't see the ending coming at all.

In case you are wondering it is a stand alone thriller.

Well done

Thank to author #evadolan, publisher #bloomsburyusa, and #netgalley for my advanced ecopy of This Is How It Ends. I very much enjoyed it and set aside two other books I had started just because I didn’t want to stop reading it once I started.
Uniquely, Ella’s storyline is told backwards and Molly’s story is told forwards. It was a bit disconcerting at first, but it worked well in the end.

Both protagonists are passionate about their beliefs. Neither is 100% likeable, though I personally found myself much more sympathetic to one over the other despite our vastly divergent world views.

The thing I like best about books is when they make me examine my thoughts about a subject I have never given much thought to (or when they change my mind about something I have thought a lot about). This Is How It Ends was a great example of this. I had never looked at the harmful side of gentrification. I knew what gentrification was, but I had not thought about the larger social implications of it. Now that my eyes have been opened a bit, I imagine I will be thinking about this novel and topic each time I pass a new building going up where an old one was near me.

Thank you to Bloomsbury publishing for sending me a free copy of this book, in exchange of an honest review. All opinions are my own.

This book didn't read like a typical thriller. I don't know necessarily how to explain it, but this book was very intricately written. Very atmospheric, I could vividly imagine things as I was reading them. I have never heard of Eva Dolan before, or came across any of her books. So my experience with her writing style is new.

I was entranced at the beginning of this book, then slowly I was loosing interest during the middle, but then the last 100 or so were brilliant! If the whole book had been as good as those last pages, it would have made for an amazing read. But for me, I felt bogged down. 

I do want to add that Eva Dolan has a very precise, and detailed writing style. I think she must be a very smart woman, she had included a lot of words, that I had no prior knowledge of, and was having to look up definitions. I do not think she is your typical Thriller writer. This was a very dreary book, the kind of book that you want to read when its grey and gloomy outside, curled up with a warm blanket and a hot drink.

Also, the ending was fantastic! A twist I NEVER saw coming, and a great way to end this book!

Ella is an activist who always seems to get into trouble. She is a squatter in a building to be converted into luxury condos. She is determined for her and her neighbors to fight it out. She held a party 1 night and there was a death. She panics and calls her neighbor Molly, who is always there for her. Together they hide the body.
As this story unfolds you get chapters of the past and the presence.
I did like Molly but did not like Ella. The storyline was a little slow and I was surprised by the ending.

Ella and Molly are activists. Ella is young and new to the activist community, whereas Molly is older and has been involved with the activist community for years. They are both living in a building that is evicting the tenants, and most tenants have already left. After a rooftop party, Molly receives a call from Ella to come help her. When Molly arrives, there is a dead man in Ella’s apartment. Due to the women’s backgrounds, they don’t think the police will believe they’re innocent, so they opt to dispose of his body and not report his death. As time progresses, mistrust grows between the two women.

This story is told from two points of view, Ella and Molly. The book starts with the defining event (i.e., the dead guy) between these two women, then Ella’s story moves in reverse chronological order, while Molly’s story moves forward with the present day. The alternating viewpoints were interesting, because this is the type of story where that works, but the time changes (past vs present) were sometimes confusing.

This was a quick read, but I wasn’t really interested in the characters. I was never drawn into the story and fully immersed. The last half of the book was much more intriguing than the first half, and I did enjoy the twist at the end.