This book was just okay. I had high hopes because I really enjoyed Dave's first book. The story fell flat and I wasn't interested.

A stunning and compelling novel that reminds us that our parents are people, with secrets and stories of their own. When their father's death is considered an accident, two siblings wonder if it's really believable that he would fall from a place where he had stood thousands of times, over many decades, for no reason at all. Finding their way past their own estrangement, they try to uncover their father's life, and who was in it that may have meant more than outwardly showed. Would someone have wanted him dead? A compelling novel that will be flying off the shelves.

I loved Laura Dave’s best-selling thriller, THE LAST THING HE TOLD ME. I even enjoyed the adaptation with Jennifer Garner on Apple TV. So, I was super excited to get a copy of her newest book. Unfortunately, life didn’t allow me as much reading time as I hoped and it took me a bit to get through it. But, I also noticed that this time, I wasn’t as compelled to keep reading as I was with her last book. I read THE LAST THING HE TOLD ME in two days and THE NIGHT WE LOST HIM in six weeks. I read a lot at the beginning learning the back story and the characters. Then, I read quickly at the end, knowing the conclusion and answer to what happened to Liam was looming closer. The middle was a bit of a slower-paced read for me.

As someone who has been grieving the loss of my dad this year, I found this quote to be so affirming. Nora is on the phone with Sam, hearing him say that he thinks they need to go to California and look into their dad’s death.

“I run my hands over my eyes, exhausted. Grief is exhausting. No one talks about that. Or, at least, no one told me. No one told me just how exhausting it feels to carry it around with you. And it uses the same muscle as love. Because with real love you have to show up and give. You have to show up and be given to. And it’s not so much that I’ve forgotten how. It’s that it’s all added up to be so heavy.”

Estranged siblings Nora, Sam, and Tommy are struggling with the grief of losing their father in a tragic accident on his property. When Sam calls Nora with the idea that it wasn’t an accident, the two of them join forces to find out what really happened that night on the cliff at his property, Windbreak.

“I don’t like that I’m thinking about the beginning. In my experience that usually happens when you are approaching an end you don’t want. Why are beginnings and endings so intricately linked? Maybe because they aren’t the opposite of each other—their DNA is the same. They are the two things we all try to fix.”

Liam, a hotel magnate, apparently kept a lot of secrets from his children. Even though both of his sons worked with him in the Noone Properties business, there was a lot that they didn’t know about. Nora wants nothing to do with her father’s business or his properties, but when she finds out he left her his cliffside home, she is confused, heartbroken over the lost time together, and struggling to find answers to her questions.

Even though there is a mystery about what happened to Liam looming throughout the story, I would be hard-pressed to call this more than that. A mystery. It didn’t feel suspenseful or thriller-like. I wasn’t anxious or white-knuckled while reading. To me, it felt more like a family drama where, over time, we get small pieces of the story that eventually will fall into place and reveal the puzzle we’ve been trying to put together.

“It feels like they’re all pushing their own agenda, like they’re sharing just a small piece of a puzzle that they don’t want us to solve.”

The story is told through short chapters, alternating between flashbacks in Liam’s life and the present day with Sam and Nora. There were several characters to get to know right away and one particular character has two names which you don’t realize until later on. I related to Nora in the story, coming to terms with her father’s death, with the possibility that it wasn’t an accident, and with some regrets over their relationship. Nora is also struggling in her relationship with her significant other, Jack, and what the future holds for them.

I really enjoyed Nora and watching her change and learn about herself in the story. Nora designs buildings, homes, etc, using neuroarchitecture. It’s a term I’ve never heard before involving spaces built specifically to benefit memory and mental stimulation, and to avoid stress. That sounds like someplace I would like to live.

If you are looking for a fast-paced thriller like Dave’s previous novel, you won’t find it here. Instead this slow burn, family drama, leads up to a conclusion that isn’t shocking but leaves you feeling like the characters are going to find a way through their grief and reach happiness on the other side. As a side note, there is a planned sequel for THE LAST THING HE TOLD ME publishing in 2025!

Suspense 3.5 stars.
Romance 4.25 stars.
Overall 4 stars.
Did I predict some things? Yes. Did I totally misread others? Also yes. Was the suspenseful conclusion kinda anti-climactic for me? Again yes. But the overarching love stories and engagement with the characters made this book so worth my time.

The Night We Lost Him by Laura Dave is a heartfelt family drama wrapped in a slow-burn mystery. Nora and her estranged half-brother, Sam, join forces to uncover the truth behind their father Liam’s death, which the police deemed an accident. As they dig into his hidden past, they discover secrets that challenge their perceptions of him and bring them closer as siblings.

This isn’t a fast-paced thriller; it’s more about family dynamics, loss, and healing. Dave’s characters feel authentic, and the evolving bond between Nora and Sam is both realistic and moving. While not full of twists, the story’s depth and Dave’s beautiful writing make it a rewarding read. Fans of The Last Thing He Told Me will find a similar emotional resonance here.

Thank you to NetGalley and Simon Element

The Night We Lost Him was such a great read and one of the books I have most enjoyed in 2024 so far. Laura Dave knows how to weave a spell from the first sentences and draw a reader in until they feel like they are in the scenes of the story themselves. The book centers around Liam, a self-made, highly successful man who falls or is maybe pushed from the cliffs of his beach house within the first chapter of the book. Thus begins his children's journey to reveal the truth about the night their father died as well as uncovering hidden truths about the man they had spent their whole lives trying to understand and know.
I really enjoyed the twist and turns of this book!

Big fan of Laura Dave's the Last Thing he told me. Her follow up, The Night We Lost him, tried to recapture some of her previous work's magic but fell a bit short. Nora's career is on the rise. So much so that she has to turn business away. Yet, she is able to drop everything and join the half brother she hasn't talked to in years on a seemingly wild goose chase to find out what happened to her estranged father, who by all accounts fell to his death in a tragic accident. Distancing herself from her fiancee while reconnecting with an old flame at the same time. Her father, Liam, is not at all likeable, having been married 3 different times, and fathering multiple children, all while carrying on an affair with his one true love. I was so excited to read the follow up, but it was a bit of a letdown.

The Night We Lost Him was my second novel by Laura Dave and I have given both novels 3 stars. I believe I just am not the right audience for her mysteries. (I would still try some of her previous works that were more straight fiction than mystery.) I found myself annoyed from the start of this book: The way the gather kept his children from different mothers separate, but apparently loved them all. Their attitudes toward interacting with one another also annoyed me, especially Nora's since there was no reason for her to hold ill-will toward her brothers as far as I could tell. In any case, I liked the book and the mystery. As the blurb said, the ending twist was a heartbreaking one. I would recommend The Night We Lost Him to people who liked The Last Thing He Told Me or to newer mystery readers who maybe don't have the expectations I do for being compelled through a book and having the characters behave in relatable ways.

I was able to read this because NetGalley provided with an arc. I loved this mystery. This was the second book by Laura Dave that I've read. Great Read. I would read more by this author.

Big fan of a drama that keeps me on the edge of my seat and plays out like a tv show in my head 🤩

Aaaannnddd laura dave is 2/2 on delivering this 👌 I really loved THE NIGHT WE LOST HIM. I thought I knew where everything was going and was totally enjoying the ride. Then BAM 🤯

The story follows estranged siblings who reconnect after their father’s suspicious death. As Nora and Sam, who each had their own complicated relationships with their dad, piece together what happened, they uncover secrets that eventually shine a light on what happened the night they lost their dad.

I just know this is going to be one of those books I look back on remembering basically nothing about the plot yet still enthusiastically recommending it because I do remember how fun it was to read.

Fans of Laura Dave's The Last Thing He Told Me will be troubled by the pacing of Dave's newest title, The Night We Lost Him, but I, for one, appreciated it. This one is not a fast-paced mystery, but more of a dramatic semi-suspense novel. I wasn't so gripped by the plot that I couldn't put this book down or felt the need to stay up and read until 2 o'clock in the morning to get the answers, but I *needed* a book that I could enjoy in pieces and delectably unravel the family members and timelines and mystery of the story. I didn't feel the need to outsmart the author and "beat" her to the twists, but rather could just enjoy the ride. I enjoyed the character development told across multiple timelines and the story immensely and can't wait for Dave's next release.

My thanks to NetGalley and Simon Element for the opportunity to read this title in exchange for my honest opinion!

This month, the #literarylovelies read the Night We Lost Him. This was my second book by Laura Dave and I was underwhelmed again. This was definitely more of a family drama than a thriller, but it just fell flat for me.

Liam was the patriarch of the Noone family as well as the founder and CEO of a large chain of boutique hotels. One night, his daughter Nora receives a phone call that her father has fallen off a cliff to his death at his beloved California home. The death was ruled accidental, but Nora can’t help wonder: was he pushed?

The synopsis of this sounds so good, but there’s so little to build on. Nora is not particularly close with her father, who is the only child of Liam’s first wife. She has twin brothers from Liam’s second wife (who she didn’t get along with) and she refuses to take any of his money or even his legacy. Nora is like her father in that she can’t commit to one man. She’s engaged to Jack, but still heavily involved with her ex-boyfriend and his son. Jack deserves better. Even Nora’s brother Sam had multiple relationships. She’s not close to either of her brothers and while Sam encourages her to look into their father together, they don’t really know each other. This book was a very slow burn; in fact it was too slow for me. I didn’t really find the ending interesting and the one thing I did like was that the book was very short and quick to read. It needed more twists for me.

Thank you @marysueruccibooks for my gifted ARC.

First, thank you Netgalley and Laura for allowing me to have an ARC of "The Night We Lost Him". I read other books by Laura and enjoyed them and was very hopeful that I would have the same experience with this particular release. As someone who devours thrillers and mystery books, this is not a book that I would say is a thriller, as there was nothing that was keeping me on the edge of my seat. With thrillers, there's a thrill aspect, I didn't get a thrill with "The Night We Lost Him". There is family drama throughout the storyline and a sense of mystery, but not a thriller.

The plot and storyline were really good. The family drama added to the twists that were bound to happen with the plot itself. I just had a hard time really connecting to the book in general because it wasn't a mystery thriller book & it is a true slow burn as Nora and Sam try to solve the suspicious d***h of Liam. The outline of the whole story had the potential to really be a top read, but it really fell flat for me. It took me 3 tries to get through it from beginning to end. I love Laura's other work, but this one really disappointed me.

Laura Dave just gets better and better! I loved this juicy mystery about the death of an aging hotel magnate who fell off the cliffs by his elusive private cottage. The story alternates between his own love story with a mysterious woman throughout most of his life, and the present day investigation into his death. The kicker is that he was married twice with three children between them, and they never knew of this woman. One thing I enjoy about Laura Dave's novels is how she combines a mystery with romance and blends it together into one great action/adventure. I always know I can trust her to entertain!

Bookish thoughts: This is my second book by author Laura Dave. I enjoyed her novel full of family secrets and a murder mystery. The chapter titles were something I rarely see and very helpful as I read the story. If you enjoy family drama and a good murder mystery, you might enjoy this one.

I received an advanced electronic copy from publisher Simon and Schuster and Netgalley. Thank you for the opportunity to preview this book.

I liked the complicated sibling relationship in this, and the fractured family themes.

Thanks to Netgalley for the free copy in exchange for an honest review.

Thank you for a copy of this book in exchange for a review. I (like everyone else I know) loved Laura Dave's last novel "The Last Thing He Told Me" so I was so excited to get my hands on her next novel. I thoroughly enjoyed "The Night We Lost Him". The set-up of a hotel magnate who seemingly falls from his property and his children are left reeling and trying to determine what actually happened that night is intriguing. The book does a good job of exploring the idea of loyalty and who our ultimate allegiance lies with as well as how we never really know every aspect of our parents and how a portion of them remains a mystery to us. To be honest, I was falling off with the story a bit in the late second act/ early third act, but (no spoilers) the twist at the end and the resolution was so satisfying that it brought me right back. Dave excels in concluding her mysteries/thrillers in a way that most other genre authors struggle with. Overall, this was a very short and satisfying mystery that I will be thinking about for some time.

This story is a popular two-timeline tale with lots of mystery involved. In the current timeline, Nora and her half brother, Sam don’t believe that their father accidentally fell over a cliff at his beach retreat in California. The historical timeline addresses their father, Liam’s long term affair with a woman known as Cory. As the siblings jet set from coast to coast in their quest to discover the truth, many suspects are introduced as they unravel Liam’s well kept secrets.
I enjoyed reading this book and really got caught up in trying to figure out the mystery of Cory and how she may have been involved in Liam’s death. The intricacies of the mystery were pulled back layer after layer and I felt like my attention was being shifted all over the place in a good way. The guessing became fun as the characters became more complicated. I did find the story to bog down a bit at times and all the flying back and forth by Nora and Sam to chase leads seemed like a bit too much but I did enjoy the twist at the end and absolutely did not predict it.

Thank you to NetGalley and the Publisher for a copy of this book in exchange for my honest review.

The Night We Lost Him by Laura Dave Is a dual-timeline story with themes of mystery, and suspense that follows two half-siblings on a quest to figure out if the death of their beloved father was truly an accident or was their father actually murdered, and if so why? I found myself a little lost at certain parts but found my way back into the story and enjoyed it, especially the reconnection of siblings and the solving of what happened to their father.

Family secrets come to light as siblings try to find out additional information and details about their father’s unexpected death. This was a good read that went between the past (Liam’s perspective) and the present (Nora) to try and uncover what happened.

Thanks to NetGalley and Simon Element for allowing me to read the ARC and giving my honest review!