That synopsis is fully ‘I’ll probably like this, but it’s already predictable’. I loved this. There was room for extra spooks.  

 

Energy: Appreciative. Caustic. Grim. 

Scene: 🇺🇸 Community of Allen’s Grove, Wisconsin. 

Perspective: We follow three siblings: the factory worker who never really left the town; the one who left young and never looked back but developed a superiority complex about it; the one who chased drugs and is trying once again to get clean. We also get chapters of a parent filming their family in the 1990s before and after an incident previously unknown to the family. 

 

🐩 Tail Wags: Uncontrived twisty turns. The sibling dynamics. The mystery and how it’s revealed. All the VHS stuff.   

 

🤔 Random Thoughts:

This is a real place, so check pics out online if that’s your thing. It’s modelled off where author grew up; skip to acknowledgements to learn more. It’s my thing, so wish I knew this before reading the book! I love exploring places an author lived in or visited or researched.  If you want to imagine it yourself, you can, it never gave me any indication with scene setting that it was a real place (i.e., no hyper specific overly details). 

 

Present tense first person multi-perspective can go wrong so easily. Not here - it works and adds to the suspense and intrigue. 

 

This isn’t a murder mystery per se. Instead, we are figuring out if it even was murder, and if so why, and who did it, but it’s mainly about the journey and seeing the characters interact and figure things out together in both the past and present. 

 

Easy listening! Just the right length. The dramatic building sometimes leans a little melodramatic but it fits the story. There are clear differences between characters.

 

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🤓 Reader Role: Almost like characters talking to us, filling us in, telling us how they feel and what they sense and observe.

🗺️ World-Building: Cinematic, immersive.

🔥 Fuel: Twists and turns, character evolution, layered secrets and lies, and relatable dilemmas. If I say anything more I’ll spoil it. 

📖 Cred: Surreal plausibility. 

 

Footsteps. TV static. VHS home movies. Car in driveway. Backroads. Keys in the door. Hugs.  

-How far would you go for family?

-Dark family secrets in a small, small town

-Low key amateur sleuthing while navigating sibling rivalry

-Really minor but kinda cute romantic subplots

 

Content Heads-Up: Opioid addiction, recovery. Loss of parent (as adult). Parental/family abandonment. Alcohol. Cancer, hospice (brief, on page). Loss of child (teen). Murder. Blood. Vomit. Gun violence. 

 

Rep: White Americans. Cisgender. Heterosexual. 

 

📚 Format: Audible