A review by enkiiii
Penance by Eliza Clark

dark tense
  • Plot- or character-driven? Character
  • Strong character development? N/A
  • Loveable characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

this book is so good. very shrewd and nuanced commentary on the ethics of true crime. and an “emotionally truthful” (as per the story’s fictional writer Alec Z. Carelli) depiction of what it’s like to be a teenager, and how that formative and often traumatic experience gets trivialized by adults until, well, somebody gets murdered. it was a difficult though entertaining read. and there’s a fun bit of metafiction in the end. 
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