Loved the cruise ship setting, but nearly half of the novel takes place during another timeline (which was a bit choppy going back and forth). As the book moves through different timeframes and is told from various perspectives, this really made the audiobook stand out and it is definitely one of my favourite ones I’ve listened to. We are a group of dedicated readers who have joined forces to bring you the best reviews of current and classic novels. There’s the locked room element – it’s difficult to get on or off easily - but also the huge and eclectic range of people you have on board – both passengers and crew. Some of these ships are so huge, I figured they’d be quite spooky and atmospheric with only a few people on them.

I can’t say more but there’s quite a few things happening in the last part and someone is being quite devious! Not so good points: I was expecting it to be sort of a locked room thriller with all the guests trapped on the cruise ship, but it didn't turn out that way, which was slightly disappointing. Overall a very enjoyable murder mystery that kept me well entertained and definitely ticked my boxes. 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 was another solid mystery, there were plenty of twists along the way, some I had worked out and others I definitely hadn't. Here is a quick description and cover image of book The Cruise written by Catherine Cooper which was published in 2022-10-30. And a New Year’s Eve party that goes horribly wrong… During a New Year’s Eve party on a large cruise ship in the Caribbean, the ship’s dancer, Lola, disappears. The plot flits between past and present and at first I did not understand how it all linked together.

I received an e-ARC from HarperCollins UK, HarperFiction via NetGalley, and am leaving this review voluntarily. I’ve said this every time I’ve read one of Catherine Cooper’s novels, but yet again she proves that she is one of the 21st Century’s answers to Agatha Christie!In terms of the plot, I really did enjoy the plot with the idea that someone has gone overboard and is assumed dead. As I said, i'd picked this up due to enjoying this authors previous work and the fact that I was expecting the ship to be well cruising. I added the Chalet and The Chateau to my TBR but never got around to reading them, so this is my first Catherine Cooper read.

This is my first Catherine Cooper book and I look forward to listening to future titles by this talented author. Lola was popular on the ship but secretive about her background, and as the mystery around her deepens, each passenger becomes a suspect. Needless to say, I didn’t guess exactly how these characters were linked, but when that final reveal came it all made perfect sense!

There’s quite a bit of the story not set on the ship and this helps to build up the lead up to the story. This already heartwrenching background of this teenage girl pulled on my heartstrings even more when the consequences of such a life manifest themselves. When a passenger sees a person fall past a windows from the upper deck onto the sea the alarm is raised and they discover that a member of staff, Lola, is missing. I felt like a few bits were over dramatic and almost cheesy, and I didn’t love the combination of the timelines. Then on New Year’s Eve on the ship there’s one of the staff members missing but reported seen falling overboard, and when the ship is docked for two months before going on their next tour in the Carribean with only a skeleton crew aboard, there’s a murder.

This was my first Catherine Cooper book (I have her previous two sitting on my shelves) and I was truly impressed.

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. The motive behind the missing persons were not what I expected and I was shocked numerous times throughout the novel. I’m working on it at the moment and it’s set partly in an overwater resort in the Maldives and partly in the home counties.