Reviews with content warning for Vomit - Tell Me What Really Happened

Five teenagers decide to go camping in the wood where girls are known to go missing; Salvation Creek. Four made it out. Maylee did not…It’s up to the four “friends” to figure out what happened to Maylee. All of them are hiding something but what? That is up to the reader, and the investigating detective, to figure out.

I love interview style books. Listening to the audio book version was also great. The voices match the age of the characters. I thought Petra’s voice actor was fitting for the character since she was supposed to be an analytical know-it-all. I would definitely recommend listening to the audio book version rather than reading this story. I tried reading at first but found it difficult and slow.

The thing is, I don’t know how I would rate this read. I also don’t know if I would recommend this to adult readers who like to read YA. I thought it was just ok. I’ve read better YA thrillers. Nolan’s character was VERY annoying and frustrating. There is always that one annoying character. I knew what had happened right as the author set up the Maylee’s disappearance. The author also had the characters make small observations but these were never answered.

One last frustrating thing was that the book didn’t get good until the 50% mark then again around 70%. It was slow pace until these points.

What I loved was John’s background about the “accident.” The author did a great job writing and depicting small town racism. It reminded me of what unfortunately happened in the small town I grew up in. The voice actor did a great job narrating this portion as well. I was very moved by how he spoke the words and felt every ounce of pain he spoke.

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daringreader13's review

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adventurous challenging emotional mysterious reflective sad tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

5.0

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avidreaderandgeekgirl's review against another edition

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emotional mysterious sad tense slow-paced

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

3.5

Well, I hated just about every character! Except for Abagail, who was used, and Josh (was it? John?) who I totally understood his anger at everyone for not understanding their privilege. Especially Maylee, what a little self-centered careless sociopath she was. Wasn't sad to see her go, to be honest! Nolan was annoying AF, with his constant, insistent, and illogical bigfoot theories! Though in the end, I guess I see how that led to the conclusion. But goodness was he ANNOYING!
The narration was excellent. And the conclusion to the mystery was unique, not who you'd expect. But boy was the journey hard to get through, with annoying Nolan it was very difficult.

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beckyremillard's review against another edition

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adventurous dark mysterious tense medium-paced

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

3.75

Five teenagers are planning on a one-night camping trip at Salvation Creek. It’s not smooth sailing from the beginning, but gets worse when one of them goes missing. Everyone has their own theories about what happened and what they think needs to be done.

I wasn’t prepared for the story to be written in this format. It was different than anything I’ve read before. The prologue confused me but I got it once I was actually in chapter one.

The premise of the story is that the four teenagers are being questioned by police about the missing girl. We get the perspectives of all four, responding to a question posed by police, which is at the beginning of the chapter. Otherwise, there’s no dialogue from the police. There are a lot of context clues, but the only direct police comments are at the beginning of each chapter.

It’s a formatting you’ll like or hate. If you don’t like the way it’s written after the first couple chapters, you will probably feel that way throughout. But I thought it was a neat way of writing.

Regarding the actual plot, it was decent and fairly quick moving. I didn’t get bored throughout and I read it pretty fast. Don’t expect to like the characters, but they were written well to understand their background.

I guess there were kind of plot twists but they were anticlimactic with the reveal. It tied everything together and shows how one action can have a domino effect, but the reveal of Maylee’s death and how she died wasn’t shocking.

Thank you to NetGalley and SOURCEBOOKS Fire for a chance to read and review this book!

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