A review by maxgardner
Come with Me by Ronald Malfi

challenging dark mysterious 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? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.0

Malfi explores some interesting themes in this—grief, the cycle of violence, the tension between your internal self and the one you present to the world (even to the people who are meant to know you best). He does a good job of giving us moments of solid creepiness and tension throughout, and I am usually a fan of blurring the lines between reality and the unexplainable. However, I don't think he quite pulls this off, though—the story is a little too windy and unfocused. The moments where he plays with events that are possibly supernatural are a bit too scattered and seem more thrown in rather than fully integrated into the plot. Some of the themes also feel a little undercooked, maybe because of how long the book feels and because at times, it feels we're retreading insights we've already uncovered in previous chapters. I'm interested to read another by Malfi, but this was pretty subpar for me.