The Cruise: The gripping glamorous thriller from the author of the Sunday Times bestselling book - The Chalet

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Lola was popular on the ship but secretive about her background, and as the mystery around her deepens, each passenger becomes a suspect. I also find it interesting that while cruising is of course one of the safest forms of travel, every year several people go missing from cruise ships, and quite often, no one really gets to the bottom of what happened. During a New Year’s Eve party on a large cruise ship in the Caribbean, the ship’s dancer, Lola, disappears. Each issue brings you destination inspiration and the travel tips you've been looking for to book your dream holiday. I doing a bit of hybrid reading with this book majority by audiobook and the last 10% by kindle as I was desperate to know the ending!

This novel looks at the lasting impact of family trauma, the inability to let go of the past (even if you know the events of it were immoral and wrong), escapism and running away from problems, guilt, manipulation and revenge. I’ve not been on a cruise ship yet but the author seemed to know the ins and outs of life on a cruise ship so well and described it so vividly that I almost feel as if I’ve been on one after reading this novel. There’s something timeless, effortless and massively fun about Cooper’s writing and I swapped between reading the book and listening to the audio for this one. This already heartwrenching background of this teenage girl pulled on my heartstrings even more when the consequences of such a life manifest themselves.

As with all good mysteries, I was eagerly detecting away myself, trying to piece together the various strands and work out what was occurring. I loved how everybody had a secret, everybody had a past and I relished trying to work out how they all slotted together. I felt like a few bits were over dramatic and almost cheesy, and I didn’t love the combination of the timelines.

With a host of unreliable narrators and an unsettling backstory that makes even the closest alliances threaten to break, this is a great fit for murder mystery readers who enjoy luxe atmosphere and an eerie look into the psychology of what might turn someone into a killer. For all ebook purchases, you will be prompted to create an account or login with your existing HarperCollins username and password. None of the characters are particularly likeable but I've come to realise that that's normal in a CC book!

I don't read a lot of thrillers and murder mysteries, so it's always fun for me to pick up a total page turner with life and death stakes, and with growing curiosity about who committed various nefarious deeds and why. Some of these ships are so huge, I figured they’d be quite spooky and atmospheric with only a few people on them. It felt totally different to the main plot and for the life of me I couldn’t see how it was going to come together, but it did so magnificently. Needless to say, I didn’t guess exactly how these characters were linked, but when that final reveal came it all made perfect sense! A MASSIVE shout out for the audiobook, what a production, I particularly loved the narrator for Antonio - he was fab!

The plot flits between past and present and at first I did not understand how it all linked together.The two plotlines were so far removed from each other but it is exactly that contrast that I love, especially when the pieces start to fall into place. Several reasons – I was partly inspired by the cruise ships moored off the South coast of England during Covid and fascinated by the fact that they are obliged to have a skeleton crew onboard.

Onboard, no one really knows who you are or where you came from so it’s easy to escape your old life and start a new one, should you want to. Two weeks later, the ship is out of service, laid up far from land with no more than a skeleton crew on board.

All of the cast are really good though and imbue each of the different characters with a distinct and clear voice. This novel to its credit really did start strongly, the details of the luxury cruise liner and immediate murder really drew me in. Exceptionally well plotted, captivating and very clever, The Cruise is a trip you won’t forget in a hurry. This is a bit of a tricky one to review as there’s a backstory but you don’t realise who this person is until later on in the book.