The Last Night {book review}

Last month I was sent a copy of The Last Night by Cesca Major to review. A polite note was included asking if I could possibly read it before the book hit the shops on the 3rd November. My heart sank a little as I find I have so little time to read, usually in bed when I’m a bit too tired to concentrate for long. However, I need not have worried, as soon as I picked up this book I was hooked.

Last year I read Cesca Major’s debut novel, The Silent Hours which I loved. The story was based around a real life event and I quite enjoy this kind of historical fiction. The Silent Hours has stuck with me since I read it, which I always think is the sign of a good book.

So I was excited to get my hands on a copy of Cesca Major’s second novel, The Last Night. Here’s the blurb:

‘She stopped at the grave and read the inscription on the tombstone, partly obscured by lichen…She was sure now that something in the bureau had lead her there.’

In a quiet coastal village, Irina spends her days restoring furniture, passing the time in peace and hiding away from the world. A family secret, long held and never discussed, casts a dark shadow and Irina chooses to withdraw into her work. When an antique bureau is sent to her workshop, the owner anonymous, Irina senses a history to the object that makes her uneasy. As Irina begins to investigate the origins of the piece, she unearths the secrets it holds within…

Decades earlier in the 1950s, another young woman kept secrets. Her name was Abigail. Over the course of one summer, she fell in love, and dreamed of the future. But Abigail could not know that a catastrophe loomed, and this event would change the course of many lives for ever…

The book follows the two main characters Abigail and Irina. Abigail was alive in the 1950s, Irina lives in the present day. Abigail moves to Lynton to live with her older sister, after the death of her mother, and the book follows her as she begins her new life.

I loved reading The Last Night, it’s a great historical detective novel set against a dark moment of British history. I vaguely knew that a terrible event had happened in the villages of Lynton and Lynmouth in 1952 and this is the climax to the story. It really didn’t matter though as the author writes a brilliant story and I couldn’t wait to read more. In fact I missed my stop on the Tube the other day as I was so engrossed in it!

I read this book in a few days and I only skipped through a few of the pages at the end about the devastating flood that hit the villages. The author gives a very powerful account of the night of the storm and I admit to feeling like I was there witnessing it myself.

I don’t want to give too much away but the ending surprised me a little. Both Richard and Abigail seemed like such strong characters and I was surprised that they stayed together after the night of the storm. I also wondered how some of the items which had been hidden away in the bureau had survived. I know that I have a tendency to overthink and was happy that Irina found closure on her life and also solved the story behind the Unknown Woman who died the night of the flood.

I really enjoyed The Last Night, definitely as much as The Silent Hours, and can’t wait to see what the author comes up with next.