jenkepesh 's review for:

All the Sinners Bleed by S.A. Cosby

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Bleh. This is why a NYT capsule book review is insufficient, and why one must be wary of the genre known as “thriller.” Torture described in detail—not for me. And even as I am wrinkling my nose and skimming past the ick, I am wondering, “how exactly would this particular torture have worked? Because it involves some things that I don’t think would make such good clues in the way they supposedly do. (I will just say that I am pretty sure skin is not a great medium for long calligraphied messages when it involves butcher knives, but maybe I’m wrong.) Plus, one of the small-town tropes that we always laugh at in Brit mysteries—the population just going about their business and holding their annual festival while a vicious monster murders denizens every couple of days, and the Sheriff has to personally invite nearby media to come news conference—it does not lend credibility in Modsommer, and it does not lend credibility in rural Virginia. The novel is overstuffed with capital-t Themes, with side characters, and with adjectives. And I couldn’t DNF it because it’s creepy and violent, so to be able to banish speculation that would keep the book alive in my head, I had to finish it.
I am simply not the intended reader, and I wish I had realized this in time,