Book Review: What A Way To Go by Bella Mackie
About the book
Meet the Wisterns. Rich. Powerful. Morally bankrupt.
Anthony is dead. His wife and four children each have a motive.
And there’s a true crime-obsessed outsider ready to expose the killer…
With a family like this, who needs enemies?
Why we love it
If dark humour, twisty plot lines and a ton of 'No way! Really?!" moments are your thing, then you'll enjoy this romp through the afterlife!
What A Way To Go is wickedly funny, sharply observed story centred on a spectacularly dysfunctional family in a world of extreme wealth.
Told from multiple perspectives, including the murder victim from beyond the grave, it's essentially a whodunnit murder mystery with an unusual twist. Anthony Wistern, a wealthy businessman meets an untimely end at his own birthday party and must discover what happened in the last moments of his life in order to move on from the big old waiting room in the sky to his designated afterlife.
It has to be said that there isn't a single likeable character in the entire book - including our murder victim. Pompous, entitled and arrogant to the core, there's not a whole lot of sympathy to be had for either Anthony or the family he's left behind. It's something that would usually put me off a book but to be honest it just added to the sheer sense of bonkers mayhem in the book. You never quite know what unforeseen plot-twist you'll be hit with next.
It’s an unapologetically outrageous and darkly satirical novel, yet beneath all the humour lies a pointed commentary on the absurdity of excessive wealth and the ruthless sense of self-entitlement it so easily leads to.
Bella Mackie paints a world where appearances must be upheld at any cost, where no one can ever really trust each other and where bad behaviour often goes unpunished if enough money is thrown at the problem.
A fabulously entertaining read that will keep any reader gripped from start to finish - just don’t expect any sort of ‘and they all lived happily ever after' ending. Though to be fair, with these characters, you’ll likely be glad of that!
