I love Lucy Foley’s books and was so excited to pick up her latest - couldn’t tear myself away!

This felt like her most ambitious book to date, with a large and detailed cast, appreciating time points and POV, a gloomy gothic setting and a rich and complex local history. It’s worth trusting the process -with so many characters it takes a little while to get inside their heads. However Foley masterfully wove the various threads as perspectives together to a great crescendo of a reveal that did not disappoint!

I really enjoyed the nuance of the varied characters, and the social complexity that The Manor evoked in the small town. Frankie’s character occasionally slipped into feeling a bit cartoonish, but I loved Eddie and his family, with their complicated dynamics.

I was lucky to read this as an ebook and audiobook, and loved both versions. The narration of the audiobook was sensational, with the feel of a full cast narration, and a heightened sense of drama. The characterisations and crisp accents really helped to establish the different characters, and immerse you into the threads of the story.

Would highly recommend!

Thank you HarperCollins UK, HarperCollins UK Audio, and NetGalley for a copy of this book. Opinions expressed are my own.

This is only the second book I’ve read from the author the other being The Guest List, and it was so long ago I can’t really remember what I thought of it, I know I enjoyed it, I can’t remember why, however this, well I definitely enjoyed this.

Dear Lucy Foley - I was just beginning to become alright with birds, as long as they were little, and you’ve just walked right in and hitchcocked the shit out of me. Thanks for that 😂

So, are you ready for the feast?
What an opener.

The manor is Francesca’s baby, a beautiful renovation of her ancestral home, with views over the beach of Tome and a backdrop of dense forestry the aim is tranquility spirituality, with perfection and plaudits, this is Francesca’s dream along with her husband Owen - Both characters were absolutely AWFUL, I nearly rolled the eyes right out of my head several times. The opening weekend of the manor is set to align with summer solstice 2025 and a midnight feast. Everything is going to plan and both Francesca and Owen are right on track - like seriously smug.

There’s a history with the house, and the forest, a dark history, the locals are fairly against all of the moneyed people coming in and taking over the town, and it seems the past is about to come back in more ways than one.

The story took a little getting into, there’s a now/then and before/after storyline and there are quite a lot of characters to become acquainted with, and we get the story from each POV, but once I was in I was right in, from around the first quarter of the story the pace is rapid, the use of Folklore in the story was excellent it added so much atmosphere and the tension was palpable. BIRDS though, I wasn’t expecting birds, and my heart was thudding, which obviously added to the tension for me.

Creepy, tense, eerie, chilling and rather satisfyingly dark!

The multiple narrators was the perfect choice for the audiobook in my opinion, it made the multiple characters a bit easier to get to know quickly.

Thanks to HarperCollins UK audio via NetGalley for the opportunity to listen to this audiobook in return for a fair and honest review.