“By the time you read this, I’ll have killed one of your husbands”
Over the past year or so, we here at What We Reading have certainly become fans of the mystery-thriller formula – a close group of friends go to an isolated location, a storm knocks out their mobile phone service, old secrets come to light etc. etc. Which is precisely what we were gearing up for when we picked up Gilly Macmillan’s The Long Weekend; following three wives as they rent out a barn out in the country, only to receive a chilling letter claiming that one of their partners may have come to harm. The question is: which one?
Was The Long Weekend just another thriller? And, how good of one was it? Join us at What We Reading for our The Long Weekend book review!
Date Published: 2022
Author: Gilly Macmillan
Genre: Thriller, Mystery
Pages: 336
Goodreads Rating: 3.47/5
Premise
The book follows three women: Ruth, Jayne and Emily. The three have organised a weekend retreat at Dark Fell Barn, a remote farm on the Northumbria moors. The three women’s husbands are due to arrive the following morning. However, upon their arrival, they are presented with an ominous letter from one of their husband’s friends, Edie, claiming that she has killed one of them.
What follows is a claustrophobic night spent inside the barn where the characters’ insecurities, flaws and hidden secrets are all brought to light. Is the letter a hoax? Has one of their husbands come to harm? And, most crucially, which one?
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What Worked
The Long Weekend is a fast-paced mystery-thriller that combines familiar elements of the genre with unique aspects that set it apart.
Firstly, let’s discuss the book’s structure. Macmillan employs a continuous-chapter approach, where perspectives, locations, and times aren’t always explicitly conveyed to the reader. This allows for numerous instances of unreliable narration, subversion, and sudden revelations, where sections of the story that a reader assumed were coming from one character were being told by another.
The characters are exceptionally compelling, primarily due to their profound brokenness. The three wives who take centre stage are all unique in the issues they face and the characteristics they exhibit. This diversity may lead readers to struggle when choosing one to support as things start going pear-shaped. Even the husbands, Edie and Edie’s daughter, Imogen, are well-fleshed-out, contributing to the depth of the story. While none of them are particularly likeable (Imogen probably being the exception), they still evoke empathy from readers, especially as the gut-wrenching events unfold.
Pacing also deserves recognition here. The gradual buildup of tension allows readers to understand the histories and troubles of these three women, prompting them to speculate on whose life is about to be completely upended. The isolated setting and stormy weather are staples of the thriller genre, though not particularly remarkable in the grand scheme of things. However, they effectively create a claustrophobic environment, trapping the characters.
In all, The Long Weekend revolves around nuanced, troubled characters, showcasing Gilly Macmillan’s ability to subvert, trick, and reveal new secrets through its clever structure.
What Didn’t
For as fun as The Long Weekend is, it’s far from the perfect book. Off the bat, the decision to not include chapters or clearly outline the perspective each part of the story is coming from is something that some readers may be put off by. It’s an essential part of the book’s experience, so not getting on with that will likely impact how much they enjoy it.
Not being told the perspective the story is being told from can be jarring, and it does lead to some confusion over which character is which, who they’re married to etc. It’s something we got over within the first third of the book, but it can be a bit confusing.
One of the major reasons why the characters are all pretty unlikeable comes from how they behave and interact with one another. Too often, their first response to a development is to break down in some form or another, and there is a real juvenile tone to how some of them speak. Whether that was intentional or whether dialogue isn’t Macmillan’s strongest point we can’t be sure, but it certainly broke our immersion a fair few times.
Finally, a few elements of the story ultimately felt more tacked on than others. The entire sub-plot around the owners of Dark Fell Burrow was given so much of the spotlight early on, but ultimately fell quickly by the wayside and didn’t even contribute to the overall plot. The inclusion of the burial mound was also hyped up early on, only to be brushed aside just as quickly.
Verdict
We mentioned it above, but The Long Weekend is all about Macmillan’s structuring. It is easily one of the best books unreliable narration and subverting everything a reader thinks they’ve worked out. Characters are thrown under suspicion, cleared of wrongdoing and then immediately thrown back under the spotlight again with each revelation.
These characters can be frustrating with how they act and some of their lines are sure to make a fair few readers roll their eyes, but it’s never enough to make them any less interesting. A few elements of the story never go anywhere and could have been dropped, but, overall, the pacing was pretty much spot on.
The Long Weekend gave us shades of Lucy Foley and Ruth Ware and stands as a seriously readable mystery-thriller that most fans of the genre are going to devour. The dialogue and certain acts could be skipped over but, otherwise, this is an innovative and gripping book that we thoroughly enjoyed!
Our Rating: 4/5
Part-time reader, part-time rambler, and full-time Horror enthusiast, James has been writing for What We Reading since 2022. His earliest reading memories involved Historical Fiction, Fantasy and Horror tales, which he has continued to take with him to this day. James’ favourite books include The Last (Hanna Jameson), The Troop (Nick Cutter) and Chasing The Boogeyman (Richard Chizmar).
