A review by definebookish
Tall Bones by Anna Bailey

dark reflective sad tense medium-paced

4.0

Part thriller, part grim portrait of life in an insular community, Tall Bones is bleak but compulsive reading. Published in other territories as Where the Truth Lies, its hook is the promise of finding out what happened to missing teenager Abi, last seen headed towards a party in the woods outside the fictional mill town of Whistling Ridge, Colorado.

The answer to that question turns out to be less crime procedural, more community post-mortem. Who could be hiding the truth in a town where the pastor preaches fire and brimstone and the cops are part of his congregation? Who should Abi’s best friend Emma, wracked with guilt, be more afraid of – the older boy who lives in the trailer park and offers to buy her booze, or the upstanding citizens who treat them both like dirt?

It’s interesting to me that debut novelist Anna Bailey is actually a Brit, though she has lived in Colorado. Perhaps Whistling Ridge has more skeletons per closet than your average small town, but certainly no more than Mare of Easttown or Twin Peaks – though it has echoes of both.

Tall Bones is difficult reading. The answers, when they do come, are deeply disturbing and desperately sad. Racism and homophobia are rife in the community, and Abi’s story made me think hard about the way that fiction so often kidnaps and murders girls for entertainment. While this one is a pageturner, it’s also so much more than that – nuanced, thought-provoking, and ultimately hopeful.
Expand filter menu Content Warnings