Kate’s Review: “The Only One Left”

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Book: “The Only One Left” by Riley Sager

Publishing Info: Dutton, June 2023

Where Did I Get This Book: I received an eARC from NetGalley.

Where You Can Get This Book: WorldCat.org | Amazon | Indiebound

Book Description: “At seventeen, Lenora Hope Hung her sister with a rope“

Now reduced to a schoolyard chant, the Hope family murders shocked the Maine coast one bloody night in 1929. While most people assume seventeen-year-old Lenora was responsible, the police were never able to prove it. Other than her denial after the killings, she has never spoken publicly about that night, nor has she set foot outside Hope’s End, the cliffside mansion where the massacre occurred.

“Stabbed her father with a knife, Took her mother’s happy life“

It’s now 1983, and home-health aide Kit McDeere arrives at a decaying Hope’s End to care for Lenora after her previous nurse fled in the middle of the night. In her seventies and confined to a wheelchair, Lenora was rendered mute by a series of strokes and can only communicate with Kit by tapping out sentences on an old typewriter. One night, Lenora uses it to make a tantalizing offer—”I want to tell you everything”.

““It wasn’t me,” Lenora said. But she’s the only one not dead“

As Kit helps Lenora write about the events leading to the Hope family massacre, it becomes clear there’s more to the tale than people know. But when new details about her predecessor’s departure come to light, Kit starts to suspect Lenora might not be telling the complete truth—and that the seemingly harmless woman in her care could be far more dangerous than she first thought.

Review: Thank you to NetGalley for providing me with an eARC of this novel!

One of my literary time stamps during the year is that if it’s summer, Riley Sager will probably have a book coming out. I have been reading Sager since his debut thriller “Final Girls”, and have found all of his thrillers to be very, very entertaining with a lot of well done twists and shocks that catch me off guard a good amount of the time. I’m always on the look out for his new titles, and when I saw “The Only One Left” pop up on NetGalley I immediately requested it, thinking about how summer was on the way. The description is a bit retro with an 80s setting, with some Lizzy Borden and “Dolores Clairborne” vibes, all of which just snags my attention. And like all Sager books, it’s another twisted winner.

“The Only One Left” is a thriller that unravels the mystery through multiple avenues and perspectives. Our first perspective is that of Kit, a newly reinstated caregiver whose suspension has put her on thin ice with her company and her father. She is assigned to care for a notorious recluse named Lenora Hope, who is believed to have killed her entire family in 1929 (but never charged due to lack of evidence), but is now wheelchair bound, paralyzed, and unable to speak due to a number of strokes. Facing few employment choices, Kit goes to live at the Hope estate, which is isolated on some cliffs above the Atlantic Ocean. As Kit cares for Lenora, and gets to know the staff and learn the history of the Hope family, she wonders if Lenora is who everyone thinks she is.. or if she’s much worse. The other perspective is the writings of Lenora, who is writing what happened to her in the months leading up the murders. There are so many smaller mysteries intertwined with the bigger overarching mystery, with questions about Kit as a caregiver, questions about what the strange noises she hears at night are, questions about why the staff has stayed for so long, and questions about what happened to the former caregiver, who seemingly ran off in the night. With so many mysteries, there are bound to be hits and misses, and while I guessed a few of the surprises and reveals, I was also completely caught off guard by others. Sager knows how to divert attention, knows how to distract the reader, and knows how to bring together so many threads that seemingly have no meaning, only for them to be significant and surprising.

In addition I really enjoyed how we had two unreliable in their own ways perspectives, whether it’s disgraced caregiver Kit, or potential murderer Lenora, and the suspense builds up in a consistent and well paced way that had my head swimming at times. I loved getting into both their heads through their perspectives, and really liked how I would be thinking one truth about each of them one moment, and then second guessing myself another moment. Even the supporting characters in both perspectives would surprise me, as they felt like they had their own secrets to discover, while also being interesting and complex in their own right. And being significant in ways I never could have guessed until the very moment of reveal!

One quibble I did have with this book was that Sager does the thing that I don’t care for, and completely shifts the ending in last couple of pages in a way that changes everything for one last big twist. You all know that this kind of story choice just drives me nuts, and while Sager opts to do it in a way that isn’t as nihilistic as other authors have approached such a ninth inning twist, it still felt a bit too far. We had a pretty good ending in place. To totally upend the conclusion always feels hollow to me, even if it is a bit more of a positive surprise. On top of that it’s very much a telling versus showing reveal, and that can work sometimes, but as a giant info dump to completely change the conclusion it just adds to my frustration.

Overall, I love having a new Riley Sager to read every summer, because his books always entertain and find ways to surprise me. “The Only One Left” is another fun thriller that you can take to the pool or the beach and have an enjoyable reading experience!

Rating 8: Another entertaining thriller from Riley Sager just in time for vacation season! The end feels a little bit tacked on, but generally it’s an enjoyable and twisty tale.

Reader’s Advisory:

“The Only One Left” isn’t on many Goodreads lists as of now, but it would fit in on “What A Strange Family”.