As an avid reader of all kinds of mystery novels, the premise of this one really intrigued me. The reader having a part in solving the mystery is a really unique premise.

The novel was full of puzzles and clues - it felt like it was cleverly written and well-thought out, which is always a positive. The reason I am a bit unsure about the book is that sometimes it felt over-complicated and the twists did not have the pay off that I had hoped. I love to sit and get cosy with a mystery but with this I was taken out from the story as I tried to understand it.

A bit of a mixed bag, but if you are a fan of reader-solving mysteries, you should try it. You may get more out of it than I did.

Thank you to NetGalley for the earc.

Thank you to NetGalley and Hazell Ward for the opportunity to read The Game is Murder.

I was instantly drawn in by the blurb — the idea of stepping into the detective’s shoes in a ‘whodunnit’ plot is such a fun and engaging concept, and I was really looking forward to seeing how it would unfold.

However, I found the writing style and dialogue quite difficult to follow, which unfortunately took away from the immersive experience I was hoping for. On top of that, there were significant formatting issues with the Kindle version I received, which made the book physically hard to read. I’ve reported these issues to NetGalley support in case it helps improve the experience for future readers.

Due to these factors, I wasn’t able to finish the book — something I’ve never had to do before with an ARC.

It’s always disappointing when a story with such a promising premise doesn’t quite land, but sadly this one just wasn’t for me.

The premise of this book intrigued me greatly as a lover of murder mysteries and puzzles of all kinds it felt as if it would be right up my street. You as the reader have to take an active part in the story in order to solve the mystery, so far, so good. But then it started to get a little confusing. There is a warning near the start reminding the reader that it will take quite a bit of effort to solve this crime and that was certainly true.
The book is divided into four acts and the first act gives the reader a lot of information to take in. Act two turns everything on its head disregarding what you have already been told. Act three repeats over again what you were told in act one which got me really confused and then act four has questions which you get a choice of answers to mostly repeating again what you have been told more than once.
The book is certainly innovative and I am sure that many people will love it but this one was not for me.

‘This book is about YOU. You are the Detective here. It’s up to you to solve the clues. And why not? Why should we have to do all the work?’

I was so excited to start reading The Game is Murder that I bumped it up my TBR list. A fan of puzzles, games and reading, I wanted to delve into the mystery and solve the case. The warning to the reader in the first chapter sets the standard – we are told it will require a lot of effort, that if you are a skim-reader or the kind of person who skips large paragraphs then this will not be for you. Upon reading this, I grabbed my notebook (which is incredibly unusual for me!) and started reading.

This book very much feels like a book of four parts and so I will review it as such. Act 1 is quite standard for a murder mystery, albeit one where you as the reader are placed into the narrative as a character – The Great Detective, and there are some asides from the narrator which directly address you as you are reading. There are 13 characters, and the case is laid out to you by the son of the accused at a party, with information from witnesses, friends, family and experts. With my notebook in hand, I started noticing some things that didn’t quite add up and I was excited to continue the story.

Act 2 then comes in and there’s a large twist which turns absolutely everything you have been told so far on its head. I certainly was not expecting what happened, but I still really enjoyed the twist and rolled with it, keen to find out more. I started to put the notebook down as there was a character introduced who was doing my working out for me. This part of the book started to introduce doubt into the story we had already been given, twisted the evidence and provided an alternative theory. The book also starts to get more meta as the narrator and the reader have conversations with each other outside of the events happening in the book.

Act 3 is where everything really fell off the rails for me. We are now in a courtroom drama, the twist setup that we were introduced to in Act 2 is suddenly revoked and all the information we have been told throughout the book is then needlessly relayed to us yet again. So much for the warning that the reader must pay attention – our concentration and attention to detail is being rewarded by the plot being spelled out to us as if we have never heard it before, let alone were trying to take notes!

Act 4 is the question-and-answer section which I suppose is where the book is trying to market itself as immersive. There’s a question about the case and three possible answers, each of which are around a paragraph long and each spell out the information that you have now heard multiple times throughout the book. There are over 30 of these questions! After the reveal I was actually left with a lot of unanswered questions which didn’t make sense in relation to ‘whodunnit’. I guess these had been put in as red herrings but with no payoff it was frustrating.

There is also a factual error which is repeated numerous times in the book which annoyed me. A blood expert reveals that blood on an object was blood type A (from one character), blood type B (from another character) and blood type AB, which, we are assured is either a third person or just a mixture of the two blood types. Cursory research will show that blood type AB is not created from A and B and would show as an entirely different blood type. In the end this evidence is not that important, but I did think something which felt wrong upon reading and is easily researched as being incorrect should not have been included.

Overall, The Game is Murder is such a fun premise (although one that I don’t think is everyone’s cup of tea), however the needless repetition of information after specifically telling us to pay attention felt frustrating. Acts 3 and 4 should be significantly trimmed down or re-written completely to create a book which lives up to the standard that the novel sets for itself in Acts 1 and 2. Thank you to NetGalley & Penguin Random House – Michael Joseph for the chance to read the ARC in exchange for an honest review.

I was really intrigued by the concept of this book - an interactive murder mystery where you play the role of the detective, piecing together clues and solving the case. It's a creative and unique idea, and I can see why it would appeal to hardcore mystery fans and it did for me too initially.

But honestly, it just wasn’t for me. I found the format quite confusing and hard to get into. It felt overly complicated at times, and that made it difficult to properly enjoy the story. I did persevere, and there were definitely some clever twists, but overall it didn’t quite hit the mark for me.

Still, if you enjoy unconventional storytelling and want something a bit different in the mystery space, it might be worth a go.

This book is unlike any mystery I’ve read. The Game Is Murder invites you to become the detective in an unsolved 1970s murder case. You're not just following the clues, you’re actively solving the case and the story won’t wrap itself up for you. You have to do that.
Hazell Ward builds the mystery through a three-act structure full of testimonies, puzzles and subtle clues. It’s cleverly written, with nods to classic whodunnits but with a modern, meta twist that makes it feel fresh and genuinely interactive. Think Agatha Christie meets an immersive escape room.
This isn’t a passive read. It challenges you to think, to engage and to question everything. I was hooked all the way through and the ending is completely satisfying because I earned it.
If you're into mysteries that break the mould and actually let you play along, this one’s for you.
One of the most innovative crime novels I’ve read in a while. Highly recommended!

Thank you to NetGalley and Michael Joseph, Penguin Random House for an advanced copy in exchange for my review.

'The Game is Murder' by Hazell Ward is written as a mystery for the reader to solve with the plot based upon a murder from the 1970's. The conceit is that the reader is invited to a special murder mystery party, where as the Great Detective they must listen to the witnesses, examine the evidence and solve the case.

Whilst I was excited by the premise of the book, in reality it is confusingly written. As someone who loves a book I can curl up with at the end of a long day, this wasn't for me. It wasn't just that the book asked me to be an active participant, rather than a passive observer. It was more that the way that it was written was too complicated to enjoy. To be fair to the author, trying to write something like this, is going to be incredibly difficult.

I was a little confused by this. I recognised the details of the murder at the beginning of the book - a very famous one from London in the 1970's, all names have been changed etc... Then it changed and I was confused. I did stick with it however and I was glad I did. This style of book took me a little while to get used to it but I'm glad I persevered.

I got this book from NetGalley when it was available to everyone to read straight away but for only 48 hours. I was mostly taken by the fact that it's a murder mystery written for the reader to solve. I have particularly enjoyed the ones that Janice Hallett has written so I hoped this would be just as good. My initial thoughts were that I did not like how the book was written. The narrators were very irritating and needlessly antagonistic in some places towards the reader which was rather off-putting. Their constant interjections were confusing, although this wasn't helped by the fact that the different font used to indicate a change in POV didn't show up on my Kindle app. They also seemed to be hinting at something which was never revealed so they were completely unnecessary. There were a lot of mentions of it being a book and expectations from a book of this nature as well as expectations from the author and the reader which was boring.

The main aspect of the plot with the son and all the experts was annoying, and I didn't get on with it at all. I often don't mind a book that's a bit different, but this was just too much and I really struggled to maintain my interest. Towards the end, there's several chapters that are filled with the questions that the reader needs to answer to work out the guilty party. They come after a lengthy recap of the situation so they seem very repetitive. It's then followed by another summary of what happened as part of the denouement. It got to the point where I was skipping over the questions because I was just so bored. I rarely skip parts of books so it indicates how monotonous it was. I just wanted to get the whole thing over and done with, and if it hadn't been a NetGalley book, I would have given up on it way before that point.

Thank you to the publisher and to NetGalley for providing me with an advance copy to read.

As an Agatha Christie fan, I was really looking to this novel. It started off well, although who was who was a little confusing. As I read on, I realised the plot was exactly the same as a well known real murder story, a documentary of which I had watched a few weeks previously. However, there were enough twists and turns to make the story interesting and different even if, as said before, the characters were confusing. I would probably have enjoyed it more if I had not seen the documentary. It is definitely a different way to write a murder mystery!

I will be honest it took me a while to get into this book as it was just a writing style I wasn’t used to and I just wanted to be engrossed in the story and clues, I am however that I persevered as when I did get into the writing style I got into solving the clues and immersed myself, it was like you could be sat at the Murder Mystery dinner party and the time you have to solve the case is running out and no one is looking to make your life easy. I liked the mix of characters and what their testimony brought to the case, I had my short list of suspects very early on from their opening commentary. I really enjoyed the quotes at the start of each chapter and ended up noting a few down! Thank you for letting me read this - it’s the first murder mystery of this style I have read and i know want to do a murder mystery party!

The Game is Murder
By Hazell Ward
Murder mystery is my favourite reading genre.
However I'm useless at guessing who did it and why, and on the occasions, I've been to a murder mystery evening or dinner, even if it's patently obvious, I never pick up the clues or who the murderer is.
This book was no different but I did have enjoy putting myself in the role of the great detective. The book has twists, turns and red herrings and the books construction and witing style kept me guessing and changing my mind.

Strange yet compelling read. Not a particularly easy book yo follow but it certainly held my interest.

I needed to find out whether the person "whodunnit" was indeed the perpetrator of the crime. This is an interesting take on the traditional murder mystery which is presented in the guise of a party with all the guests being expected to play roles in uncovering the true criminal.

A fabulously written gripping story that was a pleasure to read. I would absolutely recommend this book, it was brilliant

Seemingly Impossible Murder..
A seemingly impossible murder, a dinner party with thirteen guests and thirteen suspects and one detective - the reader. As the reader is tasked to solve the crime with the knowledge that among these guests sits a killer, the evidence needs to be untangled, red herrings discovered and secrets and lies outed. An entertaining conundrum with a sparkling premise albeit with a somewhat chaotic narrative. Can you defy the odds?

The game is murder


By means of hosting a murder mystery party at the original crime scene 50+years after the actual event in London‘s 70s, a son attempts to clear his father‘s name of accusations of murder. This extremely chaotic narrative is difficult to follow and full of literary quotes and references to historic fictitious detectives. I made quite a few honest attempts to get into this oeuvre prior to at long last (~50%) paying heed to the author’s multiple suggestions to quit reading. What a waste of time.

I was offered the chance to read this on NetGalley and, overall I found it an interesting read. Some of it was very confusing as it plays with the form of a detective novel whilst being a detective novel so you are never quite sure what is ‘real’ for the characters within it or even which of those characters are actually there in the setting of the novel! If that sounds confusing then wait until you read the book and you’ll see what I mean!
The basic premise is that there is an old murder that needs to be solved and a murderer that needs to be found. This is done through a murder mystery dinner party … or is it, I’m still not sure! It gets quite dark at times and you worry for the main character even while not being sure exactly who he/she actually is. I found it a compelling read that I definitely wanted to carry on reading but it was also a challenge at times. I think it will be a love it or hate it read!

I really wanted to love this book but I really struggled to get into it. I felt confused throughout and not in a good way.

I usually love a murder mystery, but unfortunately, I found this one awfully drawn out. I can appreciate taking a different approach to telling a story, but this one wasn't a favourite of mine. It took me a while to get into it, and from then on, it still took me an awfully long time to read. I think it might have been how the language was used in order to tell the story and give it a somewhat period approach to the story.

2.5

Reading this book I was thrown a lot by the narrator who did lose my trust after the first part. I felt there was a lot of characters so I was getting confused. I think this book will be better once it’s hit print and I can flick back and forth without worrying I’ll lose my place