👀 First impressions:
I had never read anything by Andrew Hunter Murray before picking this one up. I knew he was the author behind the Sunday Times bestseller The Last Day and that he is one of the writers and researchers on the BBC show QI, which was enough to make me curious. A novelist who also works on one of the sharpest panel shows on television? That suggested someone with real intelligence and wit, and I wanted to see how that translated onto the page.
The premise drew me in right away. In a near-future Britain that feels unsettlingly familiar, a young painter named Ben learns that his fiancée, Cara, has decided not to come home. She has been living and working on a remote island called Sanctuary Rock, the private domain of a wealthy and enigmatic philanthropist named Sir John Pemberley, and she has chosen to stay there permanently, ending their engagement by letter. Unable to accept that it is over, Ben makes the difficult journey to the island to speak to her face to face. But when he arrives, he discovers that the community Pemberley has built is far stranger and more secretive than he ever imagined. What appears to be a paradise on the surface may be hiding something much darker underneath.
It is a setup that blends dystopian fiction, mystery, and psychological thriller, and I went in hoping Murray would deliver on all three fronts.
✅ What I Liked:
Murray’s greatest strength in this book is his world-building. The near-future setting he creates is quietly chilling precisely because it requires so little imagination to believe in. This is not a distant, fantastical dystopia. It is a world where things have simply continued to slide in the direction they are already heading. Society is crumbling at the edges, resources are strained, and the gap between those with power and those without has only widened. The death of the world’s last elephant is mentioned almost in passing, and that small, devastating detail tells you everything about the state of things without Murray having to spell it out.
Sanctuary Rock itself is a brilliantly realised setting. The island functions as a kind of modern Noah’s Ark, curated and controlled entirely by Pemberley, a man who sits somewhere between visionary billionaire and cult leader. Murray captures that type of figure with real precision. Pemberley is charismatic, articulate, and utterly convinced of his own righteousness, which makes him both fascinating and deeply unsettling. You can see why people would follow him, and that is exactly what makes him so dangerous.
The novel also does something genuinely interesting with the theme of generational guilt. Without giving too much away, the book explores how the choices made by one generation ripple outward and trap the next, and Murray handles this thread with real thoughtfulness. There are moments scattered throughout the story that land with quiet, unexpected power.
Murray’s dialogue is another highlight. He has a natural ear for the way people speak, particularly in tense or uncomfortable situations, and some of the exchanges between Ben and the island’s residents crackle with unspoken meaning. You can feel people choosing their words carefully, saying just enough to seem cooperative while revealing as little as possible.
❎ What I didn’t Like:
Here is where I have to be honest. For a book marketed as a thriller, The Sanctuary does not always feel like one. The pacing is very slow, and while I appreciate a slow burn when it is building toward something explosive, the tension here does not always sustain itself across the middle stretch. There are long passages where Ben wanders the island, observes things, and has conversations that nudge the mystery forward only slightly. It can feel a bit meandering.
Ben himself is a somewhat passive protagonist. He reacts to what happens around him more than he drives the story forward, and there were times when I found myself wanting him to push harder, ask sharper questions, or take more decisive action. His motivation for coming to the island, winning Cara back, is clear enough at the start, but it gradually fades into the background as other mysteries take over. When the resolution of his relationship with Cara finally comes, it feels almost like an afterthought, which is disappointing given that it is the emotional engine that sets the whole plot in motion.
The ending also felt rushed. After a slow, methodical build, the final chapter packs in a lot of revelations very quickly. It is as though Murray spent so much time carefully constructing his world and its atmosphere that he ran out of room to give the climax the space it deserved. The answers come, but they arrive in a breathless rush that does not quite match the measured pace of everything before it.
I also think the near-future setting, while well-drawn, is somewhat underused. Very little in the story depends on it being set in the future. You could shift the events to the present day with only minor adjustments, and the story would work almost identically. That is not necessarily a flaw, but it left me feeling that the speculative element was more window dressing than structural foundation.
📚 Why You Should Read This Book:
If you enjoy intelligent, atmospheric fiction that prioritises ideas and setting over action, The Sanctuary has a lot to offer. Readers who loved novels like Kazuo Ishiguro’s Never Let Me Go or Michel Faber’s Under the Skin, books where something deeply wrong hums beneath a deceptively calm surface, will find a similar quality here. It will also appeal to anyone fascinated by stories about utopian communities, cult-like leaders, and the seductive danger of someone who promises to save the world on their own terms.
Fans of Murray’s debut The Last Day will likely want to pick this up too, and it is also a strong choice for readers who enjoy speculative fiction that stays rooted in recognisable, grounded reality rather than leaping into far-flung futures. If you like your thrillers cerebral rather than breathless, this one is well worth your time.
💭 Final Thoughts:
The Sanctuary is a novel with a terrific premise and a beautifully unsettling atmosphere that does not quite deliver the knockout punch its setup promises. Murray writes with intelligence and skill, and his ability to create a world that feels just a half-step removed from our own is genuinely impressive. Pemberley is a memorable antagonist, the island is a setting that lingers in the mind, and the thematic threads about power, control, and generational responsibility give the book real substance.
But the slow pacing, a somewhat passive lead character, and a finale that feels compressed hold it back from reaching its full potential. It is a book I am glad I read, one that gave me plenty to think about, but it left me with the nagging sense that there was an even better version of this story waiting to be told. Murray clearly has the imagination and the craft. I just wish the execution had matched the ambition all the way through.
🛍️ Where to buy
To buy your own copy click HERE and HERE
Final Rating ★★★ – A paradise with cracks you can’t stop staring at
Leave a Reply