Okay, let's be fair and say that The Hunting Party blurb sounded just my type of book. But then who can refuse a bit of a murder-mystery around the New Year - and yes before you ask, I did wait to start it until New Year's Eve (because I am that sad). Anyway, what a way to start 2019 this was!
Set in the remote Scottish highlands The Hunting Party was just a delicious unravelling of a mystery, quite Agatha Christie-esque in its telling I thought. The very well-defined characters play their parts with aplomb, sharing qualities that most of us could recognise in long-standing friends. Though I am blessed to say that thankfully none of mine share the same narcissism as Miranda. I liked the fact that the characters, whilst somehow obliged to undergo this ritual of joining together every year, don't really seem to get on that well. There are lots of cutting remarks and questionable behaviour that do make you wonder what it is that is holding them together; why their group has not gone the usual way of graduating classes and fallen one by one as the years passed.
I particularly enjoyed the structure of the story though, told through different timespans - the now, and the flashbacks to the days before New Year and before the murder. I wasn't hung up on trying to work out who had done it. and whilst obviously important. it wasn't the main focus of my attention. I was just enjoying building up the history to the death; the enjoyment of finding out about the past lives of Heather and Doug who were staffing the lodge at the time, and the various interactions the group had with each other. The sense of isolation that the setting provided meant that an air of danger was there from the outset, and carried on until the end. I really did enjoy this book, I think it's a cracking read and would really recommend you grabbing a copy when you can.
