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Book Summary and Reviews of The Club by Ellery Lloyd

The Club by Ellery Lloyd

The Club

A Novel

by Ellery Lloyd

  • Critics' Consensus:
  • Published:
  • Mar 2022, 320 pages
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About this book

Book Summary

From the author of People Like Her comes a smart and sinister murder mystery set in the secretive world of exclusive celebrity clubs.

Everyone's Dying to Join...

The Home Group is a glamorous collection of celebrity members' clubs dotted across the globe, where the rich and famous can party hard and then crash out in its five-star suites, far from the prying eyes of fans and the media.

The most spectacular of all is Island Home—a closely-guarded, ultraluxurious resort, just off the English coast—and its three-day launch party is easily the most coveted A-list invite of the decade.

But behind the scenes, tensions are at breaking point: the ambitious and expensive project has pushed the Home Group's CEO and his long-suffering team to their absolute limits. All of them have something to hide—and that's before the beautiful people with their own ugly secrets even set foot on the island.

As tempers fray and behavior worsens, as things get more sinister by the hour and the body count piles up, some of Island Home's members will begin to wish they'd never made the guest list.

Because at this club, if your name's on the list, you're not getting out.

Please be aware that this discussion guide will contain spoilers!
  1. What drives Ned Groom? What are his strongest qualities? What does he value most? How do you think that's at odds with the values of the guests at Home?
  2. Adam Groom sees himself as being his brother's equal. Do you think that's true? How do you think the two brothers differ? Why does Adam want to leave the company? Do you think Ned loves Adam?
  3. Consider the name of the resort company, Home. What is home? In what ways do the Home resorts provide these qualities or not? In what ways, intentionally or not, might the name be ironic?
  4. To know the "measure" of any Home member, Nikki watches how they speak to staff. What's revealed in such interactions?
  5. What was Nikki's situation when she first began working for Home ...
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Reviews

Media Reviews

"This masterly thriller from the pseudonymous Lloyd effectively delays revealing who among the large cast of characters has died violently...Lloyd (husband-and-wife writing team Collette Lyons and Paul Vlitos) makes the reader care about even unappealing characters, and the payoff is completely satisfying. Fans of Ruth Ware's One by One will be riveted." - Publishers Weekly (starred review)

"A satisfying and multifaceted thriller. As in Lucy Foley's smash The Guest List, readers see the plot unfold from multiple angles while the characters' dirty secrets are revealed. A perfect suggestion for lovers of locked-room and island mysteries." - Booklist

"Deliciously sinister." - Popsugar

"Are you ready for the roller coaster ride that is The Club? ... A beautifully written, densely plotted murder mystery that takes place at a private club off the coast of England. Read about a luxurious, celeb-only island during a weekend of partying and ultimately murder." - Reese Witherspoon (Reese's Book Club March '22 Pick)

"You'll need to keep your wits about you as you enter The Club. Shady business practices, moral dilemmas and a cast of characters who all have something to hide...but which one will kill to keep their secrets? This had me second-guessing all the way through and I didn't come up for air until I got to the end. A triumph!" - Sandie Jones, author of The Other Woman

This information about The Club was first featured in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.

Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.

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Author Information

Ellery Lloyd

Ellery Lloyd is the pseudonym for the London-based husband-and-wife writing team of Collette Lyons and Paul Vlitos. Collette is a journalist and editor, the former content director of Elle (UK), and editorial director at Soho House. She has written for the Guardian, the Telegraph, and the Sunday Times. Paul is the author of two previous novels, Welcome to the Working Week and Every Day Is Like Sunday. He is the subject leader for English literature, film, and creative writing at the University of Surrey.

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