Book Review of The Party by Elizabeth Day

I’m a big fan of Elizabeth Day. I listen to her brilliant podcasts How to Fail and Best Friend Therapy and I’ve read several of her books. In fact, I’ve already written about Magpie and Friendaholic, so stumbling across The Party in the magical treasure trove that is Barter Books the other weekend felt like striking gold. I checked where it came in the pecking order of her writing and was rather pleased to find it is one of her earlier novels which made me curious to see how she had evolved as a writer.

From the very first page I was captivated. Sebastian Faulks’s description “Witty, dark and compelling” could not be more accurate. And because I follow Elizabeth Day’s work so closely, I found it especially intriguing to catch glimpses of that darker undercurrent which also threads through Magpie. There is something about her ability to explore the shadowy side of human nature that is utterly mesmerising.

The Party follows the intertwined lives of Martin, a clever scholarship boy, and Ben, his dazzlingly wealthy and entitled classmate from a privileged private school background. Their friendship, if it can truly be called that, begins in their youth and stretches into adulthood, though always on uneven footing. As Martin narrates, we also hear from his wife Lucy, and the story opens with Martin being questioned in a police cell after a glittering party ends in disaster. Ben’s wife lies in hospital, comatose, and slowly we are drawn back through the decades to uncover what really happened and why.

It is impossible not to think of the Eton set, of Boris Johnson and his circle of old boys, when reading about Ben and his group of privileged friends. Angus Nethercott, the school bully who once pinched Martin’s beloved teddy, is a vivid example of the cruelty woven through that world. Against this backdrop, Martin’s devotion to Ben is both fascinating and unsettling. Rejected by his own cold and eccentric mother, who still sends the bloodied Christmas cards that her husband dropped when he fell to his death, Martin’s fixation on Ben becomes the emotional core of the novel.

At its heart The Party is a psychological study of nature versus nurture, love and rejection, secrecy, betrayal and the long shadow of truth withheld. Like in Magpie, Day moves between past and present with seamless grace. You are never left confused but instead gently led along the trail of revelations, each chapter pulling you deeper into the characters’ world.

It would be unfair to say the novel lacks a plot, for it certainly has one and a gripping one at that, but the real brilliance lies in Day’s ability to render her characters with such depth and nuance. The events at the party act less as a climax than as a frame for exploring power, privilege and human frailty. Ben himself is written with such charm that despite knowing better you cannot help but be seduced by him, and that I think is precisely Day’s point.

Catherine Chanter, in the blurb, calls it “more than a page turner” and I could not agree more. If it were published today I am certain it would be in the running for a literary prize. It is sharp, layered and gorgeously written.

As someone who adored Magpie, I could not help but notice the echoes between the two novels. The antagonist in Magpie carries subtle undertones of Martin in The Party. Both books invite us into unsettling psychological territory where love, obsession and control blur. It struck me how Day, even in this earlier work, was already honing her gift for creating characters who feel uncomfortably real. If you enjoyed Magpie, you will likely find The Party just as compelling, though in a slightly darker, more claustrophobic way.

The Party has gone straight into my top ten, though I will need to reshuffle that list to make space. A quick but profound read, dark yet compelling, complex yet utterly absorbing. I loved it.