The Last Death of the Year is the 6th modern classic mystery featuring Poirot, by Sophie Hannah. Released 28th Oct 2025 by HarperCollins on their William Morrow imprint, it's 288 pages and is available in hardcover, audio, and ebook formats. Paperback due out from the same publisher in 3rd quarter 2026. It's worth noting that the ebook format has a handy interactive table of contents as well as interactive links.
The plotting is very slow, built up over time and quite disjointed in places. There are no really sympathetic characters; they're all superficial oddballs, and the denouement is less of a crescendo than a scattershot collection of "facts" which have very little resemblance to the standards Christie employed. There were a number of outlandish plot twists which interfered with the suspension of disbelief (no spoilers - never fear), but in the end plot threads resolve, clues are sort of sorted, mysteries are mostly tied together, albeit haphazardly, and Poirot sallies forth in search of the next mystery.
Readers in search of classic mystery fare will find this one fits relatively well as an homage to the genre. Despite featuring Poirot, this one is more enjoyable without trying to read it as part of the canon.
Three stars. Not Christie, but quite readable.
Disclosure: I received an ARC at no cost from the author/publisher for review purposes.
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