Last Night

4.5 stars

Mhairi McFarlane's characters are always human in the best possible way. Each of these characters could easily have been a caricature in the hands of a less talented writer. But McFarlane made me empathise and laugh with each of them.

It's interesting to see McFarlane 'wage war' on the idea of the nice guy in her two most recent novels. In both [b:Just Last Night|54870201|Just Last Night|Mhairi McFarlane|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1606106948l/54870201._SY75_.jpg|78642686] and [b:If I Never Met You|51213487|If I Never Met You|Mhairi McFarlane|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1595853597l/51213487._SY75_.jpg|71665792], there's a stereotypical good guy whose flaws are not just brushed over due to his niceness. The heroines take them to task and instead end up with the less conventionally pleasant love interest. In both novels (but more so in [b:If I Never Met You|51213487|If I Never Met You|Mhairi McFarlane|https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/books/1595853597l/51213487._SY75_.jpg|71665792]), Mhairi touches on the cowardice and misogyny that often underlies this nice guy's niceness. But more generally, McFarlane highlights through these 'good guys', how all of us, despite our best intentions (and the lies we tell ourselves) are capable of being harmful, even to the people we claim to love. This idea is buttressed by Susie's betrayal and how Eve has to come to terms with and forgive her for it even in Susie's absence. By the end of the novel Eve still considers Susie her best friend despite the revelation of the 'big bad'.I can't deny that I felt justified when all my reservations about Ed's character were confirmed by the narrative. This would have been a 2-star review if Eve had ended up with Ed. I was so mad at him for the first 80% of the novel but I liked that their friendship did not implode when Eve called him out. It is a testament to Mhairi's character crafting ability that after spending much of the book disliking him, I was happy in the end that Eve didn't totally lose his friendship.

I truly loved this book. I probably won't be rereading it because so much of it was sad and difficult to get through (had to take multiple breaks), but I can't wait to read more McFarlane.