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amypeveto 's review for:
The Paleontologist
by Luke Dumas
“How even the simplest, most innocent act of survival—to eat, or defend oneself, or soothe one’s pain—makes waves. Ripples across the planet, and millions of years.”
Nearly 25 years after his sister’s disappearance from the museum, Dr. Simon Nealy has returned to the Hawthorne Museum of Natural History as its Curator. His stated goal is to reinvigorate the museum with the unveiling of its first predator skeleton; his hidden mission is to uncover the truth of his sister’s disappearance. But the Hawthorne holds more secrets than Simon expected. Scratches and shrieks, massive bloody footprints, and eyes glowing in the darkness are just the beginning. Soon Simon realizes there may be more than one mystery to solve.
This had such promise, y’all. Murder, mystery, and ghost dinosaurs?! Unfortunately just like my first read this month, The Paleontologist suffers by trying to do too much. I appreciate the plot devices Dumas used to draw parallels between the past and present mysteries, but felt like I was reading pieces of two separate novels. The “whodunit” seemed forced, like Dumas was trying to reconnect to the main story but not doing a great job. And the stuff I was most interested in — have I mentioned ghost dinosaurs? — didn’t get the focus I was hoping for and eventually fizzled without a real resolution. Plus there were some “white dude privilege guilt” moments that felt super out of place in a book that was already doing too much. This would have been a 3-star read, but the last few chapters ruined it for me.
Give this a try if you like scary dinosaurs and don’t mind a muddled storytelling experience.
Nearly 25 years after his sister’s disappearance from the museum, Dr. Simon Nealy has returned to the Hawthorne Museum of Natural History as its Curator. His stated goal is to reinvigorate the museum with the unveiling of its first predator skeleton; his hidden mission is to uncover the truth of his sister’s disappearance. But the Hawthorne holds more secrets than Simon expected. Scratches and shrieks, massive bloody footprints, and eyes glowing in the darkness are just the beginning. Soon Simon realizes there may be more than one mystery to solve.
This had such promise, y’all. Murder, mystery, and ghost dinosaurs?! Unfortunately just like my first read this month, The Paleontologist suffers by trying to do too much. I appreciate the plot devices Dumas used to draw parallels between the past and present mysteries, but felt like I was reading pieces of two separate novels. The “whodunit” seemed forced, like Dumas was trying to reconnect to the main story but not doing a great job. And the stuff I was most interested in — have I mentioned ghost dinosaurs? — didn’t get the focus I was hoping for and eventually fizzled without a real resolution. Plus there were some “white dude privilege guilt” moments that felt super out of place in a book that was already doing too much. This would have been a 3-star read, but the last few chapters ruined it for me.
Give this a try if you like scary dinosaurs and don’t mind a muddled storytelling experience.