Reviews with content warning for Sexual content - Murder Road

This author is rapidly becoming one of my favorites, and this might possibly be her best yet- of the ones I've read, at least. I loved the creepy horror movie feel of the story and while there was at least one aspect of the twist toward the end that was predictable, I still loved watching it play out. I couldn't put this down and burned through it in about a day and a half, and I can't wait for the next one from Simone St. James!

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dark emotional mysterious reflective tense medium-paced

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

4.0

“She was a dark, cold hole in the fabric of reality, punched through with a naked fist. The word that came to mind was unholy.”

Eddie and April are on their way to a modest honeymoon on Lake Michigan when Eddie takes a wrong turn on a dark deserted road. Their trip is completely derailed when they pick up a young woman walking on the side of the road who is injured and needs to be taken to the hospital.

This was some entertaining creepy goodness and I really enjoyed the first half of this story. It had me hooked and is a great spooky setup. However, about midway through things went a little off the rails.

On one hand, I did appreciate the further character development. It not only added to the depth of our main characters it also added just a bit of depth to the romance, bringing it a little bit more into the main storyline. I really like both the mmc and the fmc. They turned out to be completely likable flawed characters. I even liked the addition of the kooky side-characters. (I would read a series of mysteries solved by Gracie and Beatrice) But on the other hand it just started to feel like too much was going on. It all got tied in at the end but I was left feeling like the story would have been better if a few of the side details/plots were trimmed. I think the mystery and the ghost story was great and unique and didn’t need all the extra fluff. It lost momentum. It went a bit long.

So I think some people who get their feathers up when characters aren’t fully developed will really like this. And it helped push the romance a little more into the story.
But I think people who go into this for the spook factor will agree that it loses a bit as the characters are fully flushed out.

Don’t get me wrong, this was a solid read, I just can never get enough spookiness.

Side note: this is set in the 90's and I appreciated all the references to the time period even if it made me feel like this could count as historical because of it :cries:

Brittany Pressley did great with the audio.

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