At the edge of Mirror Lake’s water edge rests five luxury lodges with balconies stretched across the shores resting on stilts. The English-Welsh border runs directly through the middle of the lake. On New Year’s Day morning, a body is found. Two detectives are assigned the case, both from bordering sides.

Detective Constable Leo Brady, Cheshire Major Crime and Detective Constable Ffion Morgan, North Wales CID work together to solve a case of murder on the lake. With five lodges there’s no shortage of suspects. The list of suspects is exponentially long especially when you factor in the amount of hatred towards Rhys. Almost every character in the book has a motive to murder Rhys Lloyd making it extremely difficult for the detectives to pinpoint the reasoning.

Jonty Charlton is the investor. Rhys Lloyd is the creator. Huw Ellis is the builder. Rhys inherited the land from his father. Together they decided to sell only to the rich. The locals hated the idea of having exclusive vacation homes built on the shores of the lake. They are a community divided not just by geography but by language, background, and money.

I’m getting Mare of Easttown vibes as I’m reading about Ffion. Ffion too is a divorced woman living back home with her mom working on the police force in a small town community. Ffion knows many of the locals therefore she limits her hook-ups with guys from outside her town.

Clare Mackintosh creates an atmospheric setting within Wales. Adding to its charm is the British English verbiage of a well written British writer. Clare built a slow steady read that was typical for police procedure types. I much prefer a faster pace read. Even with its character driven storyline the activity and actions was pretty common among the residents for there hatred towards Rhys Lloyd. He was once a poor local boy who bullied a local girl and pissed off a few other locals. When he became a famous singer the list of people who didn’t like him grew. In fact, he had a stalker on one of his social media sites threaten him.

Clare Mackintosh is a British author and former police officer. Clare lives in North Wales. She writes what she knows.
Two parts. Sixty-five chapters and multiple points of views make up The Last Party. Alternating time lines from the past to the present are incorporated in chapters giving readers backstories on a few characters to help fill in the gaps of time.
The fun for me was in playing the whodunnit game. I enjoyed playing detective using the clues collected. The twists and turns added to the fun. Unlocking everyone’s secrets was exciting. The tension between the two detectives was quite entertaining.
Readers will get more books about Leo and Ffion. This was book 1 in the DC Ffion Morgan series. Clare is already writing book 2.

Thank you NetGalley and SOURCEBOOKS Landmark for the copy of The Last Party. This book was not really for me. The timelines were confusing and it was really slow, so by the time it got interesting, I was kind of over it. It’s a shame because the conclusion was great., it just took too long to get there.

Read about 100 pages and didn’t finish because too many Welsh names that I couldn’t keep the characters straight and too much Welsh language used.

I love Clare Mackintosh’s books, and this one does not disappoint. Thrilling and unexpected, this one grabbed me from the start, although it did get slow in some parts. I usually can predict what will happen in many of the thrillers I read, but this one had a lot of “oh, I wasn’t expecting that!” moments. Great read!

I received a free digital ARC from Sourcebooks Landmark via NetGalley. The Last Party includes several character perspectives and incorporates flashbacks with ease. Ffion and Leo are investigating the murder of once music star Rhys Llyod following a party at his vacation home on Mirror Lake. There is an entire village of suspects both local and summer residents. As we dive into each characters backstory we see almost everyone had a motive for killing Rhys.

Each character was very unique, well developed and interesting. I found myself quickly flipping through pages to find out the whodunnit. I have been pleasantly surprised by Clare Mackintish's writing and would continue to read her mysteries. The setting in Wales was also very alluring. I'm happy for the ARC and the opportunity to review this title.

Was there anyone in the Welsh village of Cwm Coed who didn't hate the town houses built on the English side of their lake? When a body floats up during annual New Year's swim, secrets hidden for years also bubble to the surface. Everyone is a suspect in this fast paced, cleverly plotted, who ( or who all ) done it.

Thank you to NetGalley for allowing me to read this in exchange for an honest review.

This was almost excruciatingly slow at times. That said, it was well written and had some unexpected twists. Just couldn’t fully get into it.

Clare Mackintosh is phenomenal and this series opener promises exciting things to come. A recommended first purchase for all collections, particularly where thrillers are popular.

I am a big fan of this author. Her new book set in Wales , involves a murder of a famous musician., a person who was not liked by many. This is not the easiest read; between the welch words and the introduction of many different characters, I had a difficult time remembering who was who. I stuck with it and I was glad that I did. A surprised ending and maybe a continuation of the main two characters has me anxiously waiting for the author's next book.

This is mind spinning, complex, absolutely deeply layered and well written small town murder mystery!

I’m a big fan of author! Normally if any other authors created a slow burn murder mystery with a large of number characters, I would have a second thoughts to get into the story and I could stop reading to grab another book.

But the deeply layered character stories, Wales and England detectives’ forced teaming up, elaborated descriptions of the area, smart dialogues, the plot line about multiple suspects keeping ugly secrets including main character, well structured development about a victim who is the worst man damaged people’s lives are brilliant elements that attract my full focus.

The Broadchurch vibes of haunting mystery surrounding around the tight knitted community makes you drawn into the story a little bit more!

Summary of plot: on New Year’s Eve a very rich, popular singer Rhys Lloyd is found death, floating in the freezing water of the lake, found by townies who want to swim in the lake as a New Year tradition.

Rhys Lloyd threw a big party party at that night. There are too many witnesses and also suspects because Rhys wasn’t a good man and touched so many people’s lives and ruined them including his own family.

The lake his body is found that divides England and Wales so two detectives from different jurisdictions are in charge, teaming up for solving the case. Unfortunately those two detectives: Leo Brady from Cheshire Major Crime and Detective Constable Ffion Morgan from North Wales CD had a one night stand in New Year’s Eve. Both of them didn’t plan to see each other. But now they have to act like what happened on New Year’s Eve stays in New Year’s Eve, focusing on the case.

But Ffion is under a lot of extra pressure. Even she wants, she doesn’t walk away from the case. She’s keeping a big secret, protecting someone. But who and why? Will Leo find out about her secret agenda?

Overall: this is not my all time favorite work of the author but the writing is so good. It was long and keeping taps on lots of characters was a little exhausting but I still enjoy to get lost in this smart, challenging murder mystery! The ending was heartbreaking and moving!

I’m rounding my 3.5 stars to 5 I have to learn Welsh language stars.

Many thanks to NetGalley and Sourcebooks Landmark for sharing this amazing digital reviewer copy with me in exchange my honest thoughts.