Reviews with content warning for Child abuse - A Flicker in the Dark

This book starts with an unnecessarily triggering description of a mentally unwell teenage girl. I was able to mentally push past that just to get 80% of the way through the book where the main character does something I CAN’T stand in books and find incredibly unethical. So I know for those reasons I can't rate it higher than a 3...it's getting a two because quite frankly there were just too many oh my God I can't trust these people in her life and like i get it, but also like couldn't she have at least ONE person in her life who could be trustworthy? Oh she did...but yeah they weren't actually so this poor girl (woman) left the book with literally no ONE. Had that plot twist 80% of the way through NOT happened and she at least got a HEA I THINK I could have gotten up to a 3.5 4 star.

I just can't with people who use their horrific experiences as a reason to cheat on an otherwise loyal partner.

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vivireads99's review

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dark emotional mysterious tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.5

Not too bad! It kept me engaged for the first half. I could see the plot twist coming from a while away. Some decisions of the FMC just made me annoyed. Other than that I think it’s a pretty easy and decent read!

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ellainalisa's review

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dark mysterious tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.5

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thejenstamps's review

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dark mysterious tense fast-paced

4.0

Some really good twists!

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alexismong720's review

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dark emotional mysterious tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

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aprilblues348's review

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challenging dark emotional mysterious tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.0

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kaynova's review against another edition

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dark mysterious tense slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.0

It took me a full work day to finish this audiobook, which is a good thing because that means I deeply enjoyed it and found myself immersed into the story. However, the characters made me MAD! Which most times in mystery/suspense books that happens but the reason this book ups it a little is because Chloe is a dumb b*tch. Girl, you are still recovering from years of trauma from your father's arrest and you don't even think to change your name and move further from Louisiana. You move only an hour away and think NO ONE knows who you are. Darling, the case happened in 1999, the beginning times of the internet, and 20 years later, is the height of the internet, yes everyone friggin knows! To honestly believe her fiance did not know was laughable. He definitely knew, but he didn't know how to say it like her other flings and boyfriends. You would think if she's going to keep going through this to just be open and honest to weave people out of her life, but again, no she doesn't. Instead, she gets vulnerable with the wrong people (which isn't always her fault) and is honest at the times she should've been honest before.

Now, I love a good unreliable narrator trope (though imo, anything written in first person is an unreliable narrator, but we will digress). As readers, we are going through the days with her and learn she has mass paranoia and PTSD that makes it difficult for her to trust people. But how you don't trust people but get engaged to a man a year later? Or

fuck the fake reporter only knowing him for like three weeks

? It didn't make sense to me at times and I tried to reason it with her drug abuse and her past trauma, but I can tell the author was not going that route, so her inability to put distance between people has nothing to do with her trauma, though she says it is. She said something about laying down with people to feel another heartbeat against hers, but she gets too close to the wrong guys (except Daniel, though he had his own issues. Like you knew who her dad was and her situation AND still threw her surprise party and sexually choked her during sex. Like dude did not communicate or read the room). I kept wondering what makes a person qualified to be in her circle, in her heart and I didn't get any answers.

MAJOR SPOILER AHEAD

I really wanted it to be Cooper and Daniel as the masterminds of this, but when it turned midpoint, I was hoping it was all three in some crazy way. I loved the twist but I was still disappointed. I don't know why; I just was. Cooper, like many serial killers, don't need a reason for being a murderer and I'm glad the author stuck with that, though the whole "it's the darkness. the devil himself" blew me because not one second did the author introduce them as god worshipping people. It was very believable and the entire book you get clues who's the real guy though, again, Chloe Davis is a dumb b*tch. A lot of ways she reminds me of Pip from AGGGTM by never looking at every angle. She jumped right in and thought it was her fiance and some point I agreed until certain things still bothered me. She kept chasing after him and never took her own advice. The advice that the arms that she kept running to should have been the arms she should've ran away from, and those arms were her brother's.

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