Book Review: The Last by Hanna Jameson

Click Here to Purchase on Amazon! $12.99 Kindle | $27 Hardcover

Publication Date: April 9, 2019

Pages: 352

My Copy Came From: NetGalley & Atria Books

Read Via: Kindle

My Like Level: 4 out of 5

Genre: Mystery, Thriller, Suspense, Science Fiction & Fantasy, Dystopian, Post Apocalyptic (MY FAVE!)

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Book Summary from Amazon:

For fans of high-concept thrillers such as Annihilation and The Girl with All the Gifts, this breathtaking dystopian psychological thriller follows an American academic stranded at a Swiss hotel as the world descends into nuclear war—along with twenty other survivors—who becomes obsessed with identifying a murderer in their midst after the body of a young girl is discovered in one of the hotel’s water tanks.

Jon thought he had all the time in the world to respond to his wife’s text message: I miss you so much. I feel bad about how we left it. Love you. But as he’s waiting in the lobby of the L’Hotel Sixieme in Switzerland after an academic conference, still mulling over how to respond to his wife, he receives a string of horrifying push notifications. Washington, DC has been hit with a nuclear bomb, then New York, then London, and finally Berlin. That’s all he knows before news outlets and social media goes black—and before the clouds on the horizon turn orange.

Now, two months later, there are twenty survivors holed up at the hotel, a place already tainted by its strange history of suicides and murders. Those who can’t bear to stay commit suicide or wander off into the woods. Jon and the others try to maintain some semblance of civilization. But when the water pressure disappears, and Jon and a crew of survivors investigate the hotel’s water tanks, they are shocked to discover the body of a young girl.

As supplies dwindle and tensions rise, Jon becomes obsessed with investigating the death of the little girl as a way to cling to his own humanity. Yet the real question remains: can he afford to lose his mind in this hotel, or should he take his chances in the outside world?

Click Here to Purchase on Amazon! $12.99 Kindle | $27 Hardcover

My Thoughts:

This book has a ton of storylines. The main one being that nuclear bombs have gone off all over the world. There are many thinly veiled jabs at our current president without officially naming him as the reason behind the end of the world. I thought that was funny. It is very interesting to read books currently being written with obvious political motivations. I found myself laughing out loud as the characters in the book literally form groups on the left and right side of the room and begin pointing fingers at those who admitted voting for the current administration in the time the novel takes place.

The Last reminded me of two of my all times favorite shows, Lost and The Leftovers. The reason I say that is because The Last plays with your sense of reality a bit. It eerily makes you question what is real, and what is possibly only occurring in the characters imagination. There are ghost sightings, and more than one of the characters questions whether all of the survivors in the story are in some type of Purgatory.

To make matters more complicated, the body of a young girl is found in a water tank on the roof of the hotel. So, not only are we faced with the end of the world, but there also may be a murderer among them. Oddly enough, Jon our main character seems to be the only person who cares about it and he cannot seem to understand why no one else seems bothered enough to try and figure out what happened. Did the murder happen before the bombs? Or after? Who would kill a little girl?

While reading this book I was on edge of my seat the entire time. The mood is creepy from the very beginning. The hotel is isolated in the middle of the woods in Switzerland. It is old, and has a history of strange occurrences and many deaths. Suicides, accidents, etc. Many of the guests say that they have experienced strange encounters with ghosts and hear rattling in the halls at all hours. The weather is cold although Winter hasn’t arrived, and the guests can only imagine that it’s due to the nuclear bombs fallout blocking the Sun.

I had been really anticipating this books release, and was ecstatic when I was given an advanced copy to read. So thanks a ton to the publisher and to NetGalley. I happily read this book in exchange for an honest review.