NINE LIVES

 

SYNOPSIS

If you're on the list you're marked for death.

The envelope is unremarkable. There is no return address. It contains a single, folded, sheet of white paper.

The envelope drops through the mail slot like any other piece of post. But for the nine complete strangers who receive it - each of them recognising just one name, their own, on the enclosed list - it will be the most life altering letter they ever receive. It could also be the last, as one by one, they start to meet their end.

But why?

Title: Nine Lives

Author: Peter Swanson

Publisher: Faber & Faber

Publication date: March 3, 2022

REVIEW

RATING: ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐

He’s back, back, back again! It is not a secret that Peter Swanson is one of my favorite authors so when a couple of days ago I received a mail saying I had been approved for an eARC, I knew I was gonna put all my current reads on hold to read Nine Lives immediately. I was done with it in less than 24 hours so good it was!

Nine people receive a list with their names on it. None of them know each other, but when they start getting murdered one a time it is clear to the authorities that there must be some secret linking them all together.

Nine Lives had big Rules For Perfect Murders and The Kind Worth Killing vibes, so I was absolutely hooked right from the start. All the different POVs and short chapters kept propelling the story forward without a chance for you to catch your breath. No one was safe, and that uncertainty of not knowing who could die next, kept me on my toes the whole time. There was a chapter where I actually yelled at my Kindle “oh no, you didn’t! How dare you?!”, so shocking it was.

I absolutely adored all the parallels with And then there were none (favorite book ever). Some history was provided about that book and its title changes throughout the years. Although as a huge Agatha Christie fan I already knew about it, I loved seeing it there. In my book, if you reference the Queen of Crime in your story you have done your job well.

I liked how the nine characters were immediately introduced, what really helped to keep them straight as the story progressed. Sometimes, when there’re so many characters, they all start mixing together, but here they were all easily distinguished.

Towards the end there was another shocking moment with the villain reveal that I did not see coming. I’m a bit on the fence about the killer’s motivations, but hey, who knows what goes through a killer’s mind? The final chapter was another unexpected twist that made for the perfect ending (in hindsight I noticed there was a clue earlier on about it).

Thanks to NetGalley and Faber and Faber for providing an eARC in exchange for an honest review.