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rachelibrarian's review
challenging
dark
slow-paced
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
3.0
I really enjoyed reading this book at first but then it got bogged down by the environmental storyline and I felt like the ending was just all over the place.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death, Gore, Sexual assault, and Cannibalism
queerreadss's review
dark
mysterious
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? N/A
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.0
This book is an exceptional debut. For the most part, it felt well developed and tied up its lose ends. There was a lot of different plots happening at once in this book, inevitably leaving some things to be rushed. The plot lines did feel quiet busy in some parts but I did like how it came together and answered almost all questions going on in the book.
The beginning scene definitely was a strong way to draw readers in and build suspense that the author upheld extremely well throughout the book. The author was able to capture the true sinister feel of the grizzly crimes throughout the novel as well. The detail of the crimes and crime scenes were very disturbing and not for the faint of heart.
Main character Sergeant Riley’s traumatic past was told in parts that kept me guessing and was important to the plot as the sight of her old friend as a victim to an unknown killer brings decades of trauma to the surface. There was definitely a level of subplot about how exactly trauma can ruin your life and the lives around you which was, at times, extremely raw. Even still, I don’t know if the book fully handled that but it was an interesting dynamic as things in Riley’s smallish town just kept getting more and more bizarre.
All of that said, this book was very thrilling and did a good job of executing the multiple POVs. I wouldn’t say all of the twists/ how it came together was necessarily extremely hard to guess but the plot felt unique up until I realized a lot of the key points of the final solution were similar to the movie “Zootopia.” While obviously this book has a lot more adult themes and storyline, there were obvious similarities and it made the plot feel less unique once I realized it.
Overall, I would still recommend this book as a pretty decent thriller/mystery. This book will obviously be continued and I would be very interested to read the next one as well.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death, Murder, and Gore
Moderate: Car accident
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