“Not every old hurt could be healed. People, like water, had a way of flowing imperfectly on.”

Cicadas Sing of Summer Graves is a Southern gothic horror with hints of magical realism. And the author is actually two authors, Quinn Connor is made up of Alex Cronin and Robyn Barrow.

This book had a very slow start and I contemplated DNFing a couple of times. Took a little too long to get going so could’ve been cut shorter I guess, but I was propelled by the concept and mystery of the town. The middle picked up more to where I felt more motivated to read it and didn’t want to put it down after the 60% mark!

I appreciated the foreword from the authors about the inspiration to write this book, telling the history of the creation of some US lakes (like Lake Lanier) created by flooding towns and killing, or displacing, its residents-creating generational trauma and a form of gentrification.

The novel is told in third person, focusing on our three FMCs June, Lark, Cassie, (and sometimes Bolt). The chapters were longer than I liked but that’s a personal preference. The second half was better than the first half which is why I bumped it to 4 stars, it just took a little too long to get to the “guts” of the story.

The novel had a fantastic ending that ties things up but also leaves it a little open for the character’s futures! Overall a really beautiful, heartbreaking story that makes me want to know more about the true histories behind the novel. I also want to include the following two quotes from the foreword to highlight the authors’ efforts in writing this book:

“We wanted to wrestle with submerged histories, memory lost and found, and the impact of ‘progress’ on communities and land. Through this novel, we seek to honor and sensitively engage with these complicated histories so deeply entrenched in the places we come from.”

“Too often, the dispossessed were not duly compensated for what they were forced to leave behind. With deepest respect, we acknowledge these wrongs. This book is set in a fraught land and addresses violence, complex intergenerational pain, and particularly class-based trauma.”

Thank you to Netgalley and Sourcebooks Landmark for the eARC!