A review by orinposner
Dirt Town by Hayley Scrivenor

dark emotional inspiring mysterious reflective sad tense fast-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? Yes
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

 An incredible novel, beautifully and carefully written. It tells the story of a girl’s disappearance and its investigation, but really the story of a small town with all the people in it, and their complicated, gut-wrenching, heart-breaking, very real lives.

This book made me cry and cry, and for many different reasons. I felt sad, scared, confused and frozen along with these characters. There are 5 different POVs: the detective, two (extremely loveable) children of the town, the mother of the missing girl, and a fascinatingly strange first-person plural (“we”). The writing is astoundingly good, and by that I mean not just beautiful prose, but the detailed language of people’s minds – how they think, what they pay attention to, what they remember.

I was also hooked on the mystery, anxious for the detective (another great character) to gather more information, and flipping back pages to re-read and re-consider earlier scenes once I figured something out. 
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