The Last Day by Andrew Hunter Murray

Genre: Science Fiction, Dystopian
Author: Andrew Hunter Murray
Published: Feburary 2020
Publisher: Penguin Random House
Pages: 432 {hardback}

Review on Goodreads

Thank you to Penguin Random House for sending me a copy of this in exchange for an honest review

Initial Thoughts Upon Finishing

Unfortunately, even once I reached halfway through this book the plot still hadn’t picked up. I found this quite dry and unexciting – it didn’t pull my attention enough to make me believe it was a thriller or worth persevering with. Not for me!

The Last Day

This book has an incredibly interesting (and popular) concept going for it that I was so excited to explore. It is set in the future where the earth’s rotation has gradually slowed to the point it is no longer turning. People struggle to survive with the lack of day/night and the impact this had on crops and the habitability of certain countries.

It follows a woman called Ellen who works on a boat and for the most part stays away from the depressing everyday life in England: one of the few countries still habitable. She receives a mysterious letter from a man she once knew that brings her back to England. It contains a powerful secret that has been fiercely protected. One that people would kill to conceal.

Why I DNF’d It

I DNF’d this at 37% because it had been a real slog to get to that point and I still didn’t know a single thing more than what the very, very brief blurb had told me. I had expected there to be a lot more drama and many thrilling events from the very start of this. But I was really surprised at how gruellingly slow the pace of this book was.

I considered hanging out for a plot revelation about this supposed secret but I just wasn’t gripped enough to continue hacking through my progress in this book. I found the main character, Ellen, quite unlikeable in her extreme stand-offish nature. I also found the setting completely unexciting. For a world that had stopped turning we stay confined within a very small setting, doing very little world-building, and this was nearly the halfway mark.

Summary

I’m truly disappointed that this wasn’t all I hoped it to be. So very little happened in the first half of this book and I find myself struggling to explain the little that did. I don’t remember the last time I read a book that explained just about less than the blurb itself even by the 37% mark! I know there are many other books out there exploring the concept of a world stopped turning so I would find it hard to recommend this to anyone when I know there are (likely) better alternatives out there.