A review by xabbeylongx
The Last Passenger by Will Dean

dark emotional mysterious sad tense medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? It's complicated
  • Loveable characters? No
  • Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.0

Spoilers Ahead:
Well. Nothing could have prepared me for anything that happened in this book. I’m quite pleasantly surprised, to be honest; I wasn’t expecting the ending, but everything was very unique and kept me intrigued. 
We follow Caroline - or Caz, as she prefers to be called - as she goes on a cruise with her boyfriend, Pete. They’ve been together a few months, and they want to spend some time away with each other. However, when Caz wakes up and find him gone, she starts to panic. When she looks around the rest of the ship, she finds that everyone else is gone too. She finds a few people around the ship, Daniel, Frannie and Smith, and they work together to try and figure out what’s going on. 
There are lots of things that start going wrong. There’s no food, no hot water, not any water, actually. They have to forage through other people’s belongings for food, and then put out buckets to collect rainwater to drink. And it’s very cold, the power is down, and there is no one driving the ship. 
After a few days, everyone feels very subdued. They find a screen, and there are a pair of lips on the screen who talks to them. They allow them to ask one question each day about the situation, but they give vague answers, leaving them just as confused as they was before. They find out they are part of a game show, one that is actually only shown on the dark web. And, because it’s in the middle of the ocean, the laws aren’t exactly too strict out there, with no enforcements to help them. They want to know how to get off, how to get out of the hell, especially as they didn’t agree to it, but apparently when booking the tickets, that was in the agreement, so they had no choice. There is a cash prize at the end of it, and Caz stays on to try and repay her dad’s debts (he was a gambling addict, and stole money from a charity to help him pay for things, before he TW killed himself). Lips - that’s what they decided to call the anonymous woman on the screen - told them to pick an element each, and that to win, they had to complete their challenges. 
Smith was up first, and he had to sort out a puzzle in the library. It was quite easy-ish, and so the rest of them weren’t too worried. However, when a box labelled ‘Do Not Touch’ is opened, they have a punishment. Whilst there is still no food and water, Caz has to jump into the water and try to be saved by the other people on the boat. Daniel has to try and do some climbing, and then falls into the pool, where he is the covered. They presume him to be dead, because there’s no way he’d be able to breathe under the boat. 
Now one of them is gone, there are 3 of them. They then find Lips on the ship. She was the host, but then apparently got conned out of her job, and now she’s one of them. They’re back to 4 people now - hurrah! Frannie has her challenge, which is to climb up a mast and collect something from the highest peak on the ship. She nominates Caz, who is shocked and hurt. However, credit where credit is due, she did it. And when she gets back down, Frannie TW commits suicide, jumping into the ocean before anyone can save her. 
Caz, who saw her as a little sister, felt the loss immediately. And when there is a fire on the deck, they run to find where Lips has gone to - at the back of the boat - and she’s in a helicopter. She double-crossed them; she was never on their side. Her and Smith are the only ones left, and when they explore the ship some more after Lips left a key, they find all of the other passengers locked in a room, infested with rats, all of them dead. Smith knows his friend is in there, he just has a vibe, and Caz mourns Pete, thinking he’s dead. 
In the end, they both decide to jump off, saying they didn’t want the ship to have the power of killing them, and so planned to jump off themselves. Unfortunately, on the boat only some of the life jackets worked; and Smith didn’t have one that worked. So he disappeared under the waves, and Caz felt close to giving up. She bobbed along, until she was rescued by people. 
She won the show! She found out that Daniel and Frannie are still alive (they are actors, and part of the show) and that Smith managed to be saved. Everyone wanted to interview her, but she was emotionally drained. She had a call from her sister, Gemma, and her mum. And Pete’s alive, and he manages to take her home. Apparently, there was always medical staff on hand, but mentally, Caz will never be the same again. 
This book wasn’t exactly a horrific read for me, but the feelings it gave me made me feel extremely uneasy, it’s unreal. Like real feelings of having your stomach drop. Basically this whole book was just one big stomach-drop. I got so engrossed and imagined myself if I was in Caz’s position, and honestly, I would have given up a long time before they all did. It’s a mind-fuck book, and it makes it so good. The plot I wasn’t expecting for, making it into a gameshow is not something I thought would happen, so points for originality! I was looking forward to there being a little bit of a paranormal element to the book, but I do like where the book ended up. 
I wasn’t a fan of any of the characters to be honest with you. Caz was a little whiny (obviously I know the situation she was in was very, very awful, but I felt she often whined a lot, and it kept me from liking her. Especially when she had the chance to leave the ship, and fair enough that she wanted to stay on to settle the debts her dad made, but was it worth the trauma she went through? No amount of money offered to me could have convinced me to stay on that ship, even before finding out what the challenges were. 
I think Daniel was okay, I wasn’t a fan of Smith as I found him to be very selfish, and I suppose Frannie was a decent character, but it was all an act anyway. Broke my heart finding out about Daniel and Frankie actually being actors. Like as a reader, I mourned the characters I knew, but they weren’t real - we were mourning fake characters. And then to find out they were in on it all along, is actually crazy. I felt a bit betrayed too, which means that the book did a really good job, I personally think. And don’t even get me started on Pete… poor excuse for a man. The way he left her in the beginning, and then hardly did anything to find her (yes he called a few people, but so what? She could have been in real danger!) and the way he didn’t understand her after, making excuses for himself and keeping asking her if she could do interviews. After the ordeal that she went through? He’d be out the door if I was in Caz’s shoes. A few months of dating are easy to get over, and after everything Caz went through, I’m sure she could handle it. 
Anyway, enough of the hate-Pete speech, I want to finish off by saying this is a very good book, full of suspense and deeply gut-wrenching, and I would definitely recommend! 
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