Lawn Boy

For Mike Muñoz, a young Chicano living in Washington State, life has been a whole lot of waiting for something to happen. Not too many years out of high school and still doing menial work—and just fired from his latest gig as a lawn boy on a landscaping crew—he knows that he’s got to be the one to shake things up if he’s ever going to change his life. But how?

In this funny, angry, touching, and ultimately deeply inspiring novel, bestselling author Jonathan Evison takes the reader into the heart and mind of a young man on a journey to discover himself, a search to find the secret to achieving the American dream of happiness and prosperity. That’s the birthright for all Americans, isn’t it? If so, then what is Mike Muñoz’s problem? Though he tries time and again to get his foot on the first rung of that ladder to success, he can’t seem to get a break. But then things start to change for Mike, and after a raucous, jarring, and challenging trip, he finds he can finally see the future and his place in it. And it’s looking really good.

Lawn Boy is an important, entertaining, and completely winning novel about social class distinctions, about overcoming cultural discrimination, and about standing up for oneself.

Trigger warnings: homophobic language, sexual content, language, drug abuse, alcohol use

My rating: 3 out of 5 stars

This was the strangest book I have read in a long while, but I think I liked it. Mike is just trying to figure himself out. Through the changing jobs and the people who are drifting in and out of his life, I was beginning to wonder about the choices he was making. Then I started to see him become more sure in his own decisions and understood. This isn't about the decisions I would make, but about him becoming the man he was supposed to be. I love how supportive his family is, how much his friend comes beside and supports him (even if he is a real homo-phobe a**hole). I just love teh realness of this story.

Some of my favorite quotes, these are scattered through the book - percent of the way through shown in parenthesis after the quotes, if you are interested:

  

At this point, I feel like I’m nothing more than what everybody needs me to be or whatever the situation demands of me. (3%)

That’s what kids should do, they should laugh. If there’s a better, righter sound in the whole world than the laughter of children, I don’t know what it is. (5%)

I’ve come to believe that to a large degree we are products of our environment. (10%)

No matter how deep the infection runs, family is family. The only other choice is to cut them off like rotten limbs. (31%)

the moments are fleeting, like my mom’s smile, and it’s not often we have control over them, and that just makes them all the sweeter. (39%) 

when the questions become too numerous and the considerations begin to feel a little overwhelming, you just have to look away for a minute and regather your vision for the thing, try to see it the way it originally came to you. Ask yourself, how did I arrive here? What was I trying to accomplish? (90%)

So, whoever you are, whatever your last name is, wherever you came from, whichever way you swing, whatever is standing in your way, just remember: you’re bigger than that. Like the man said: you contain multitudes. (90%)

The Paradox Hotel

An impossible crime. A detective on the edge of madness. The future of time travel at stake.

January Cole’s job just got a whole lot harder.

Not that running security at the Paradox was ever really easy. Nothing’s simple at a hotel where the ultra-wealthy tourists arrive costumed for a dozen different time periods, all eagerly waiting to catch their “flights” to the past.

Or where proximity to the timeport makes the clocks run backward on occasion—and, rumor has it, allows ghosts to stroll the halls.

None of that compares to the corpse in room 526. The one that seems to be both there and not there. The one that somehow only January can see.

On top of that, some very important new guests have just checked in. Because the U.S. government is about to privatize time-travel technology—and the world’s most powerful people are on hand to stake their claims.

January is sure the timing isn’t a coincidence. Neither are those “accidents” that start stalking their bidders.

There’s a reason January can glimpse what others can’t. A reason why she’s the only one who can catch a killer who’s operating invisibly and in plain sight, all at once.

But her ability is also destroying her grip on reality—and as her past, present, and future collide, she finds herself confronting not just the hotel’s dark secrets but her own.

I think if I would have read this book instead of listening to it, I might have enjoyed it more but I got a little confused. What I did enjoy was the main character January. There were times that her reactions and the way that she handled things just make me laugh or at least smile. Loved the ending of this book though. <3 

Leah on the Offbeat

TW: Body shaming, moderate cursing, racism, fat-phobia, homophobia and minor alcohol consumption. 

Leah Burke—girl-band drummer, master of deadpan, and Simon Spier’s best friend from the award-winning Simon vs. the Homo Sapiens Agenda—takes center stage in this novel of first love and senior-year angst.

When it comes to drumming, Leah Burke is usually on beat—but real life isn’t always so rhythmic. An anomaly in her friend group, she’s the only child of a young, single mom, and her life is decidedly less privileged. She loves to draw but is too self-conscious to show it. And even though her mom knows she’s bisexual, she hasn’t mustered the courage to tell her friends—not even her openly gay BFF, Simon.

So Leah really doesn’t know what to do when her rock-solid friend group starts to fracture in unexpected ways. With prom and college on the horizon, tensions are running high. It’s hard for Leah to strike the right note while the people she loves are fighting—especially when she realizes she might love one of them more than she ever intended.

I thought this was a fun book. I loved Simon vs the Homo Sapiens Agenda and this book just gave me the opportunity to get to know the characters better. This time the focus is on Leah. Leah is (as described by the author) An anomaly in her friend group, she’s the only child of a young, single mom, and her life is decidedly less privileged. She loves to draw but is too self-conscious to show it. And even though her mom knows she’s bisexual, she hasn’t mustered the courage to tell her friends—not even her openly gay BFF, Simon

Gave this one three stars on goodreads. 

Little Girls Sleeping

He looked down at the little girl, sleeping peacefully, her arms wrapped around a teddy bear. He knew he was the only one who could save her. He could let her sleep forever.

An eight-year-old girl, Chelsea Compton, is missing in Pine Valley, California and for Detective Katie Scott it’s a cruel reminder of the friend who disappeared from summer camp twenty years ago. Unable to shake the memories, Katie vows she won’t rest until she discovers what happened to Chelsea.

But as Katie starts to investigate, the case reveals itself to be much bigger and more shocking than she feared. Hidden deep in the forest she unearths a makeshift cemetery: a row of graves, each with a brightly coloured teddy bear.

Katie links the graves to a stack of missing-persons cases involving young girls—finding a pattern no one else has managed to see. Someone in Pine Valley has been taking the town’s daughters for years, and Katie is the only one who can stop them.

And then another little girl goes missing, snatched from the park near her home.

Katie’s still haunted by the friend she failed to protect, and she’ll do anything to stop the killer striking again—but can she find the little girl before it’s too late?

My rating: four stars out of five 

Katie is fresh home from Afghanistan, trying to settle back into civilian life, unsure what she will be doing. Before she left she was a policewoman, but she isn't sure she wants to go back there. In the meantime, she's working for her uncle, the sheriff of Pine Valley, California.

She somehow breaks wide open the case of two missing girls.

What follows is a twisty turning mystery.

At times it was a bit unbelievable and the ending felt a little unreal, but it was still a really good book. I plan on reading at least the next in this series. I love Katie and her amazing dog Cisco. Watching her rebuild relationships with the people that she grew up with is interesting.

Stand out quotes: 

“Places change all the time. People change. A way of life changes. You can’t freeze time or expect things to stay the same. They never will, no matter how hard you try to hold onto them.”

Relaxing was key at the moment the anxiety struck. You couldn’t fight it. You couldn’t reason with it. And it wouldn’t make you promises that it wouldn’t come back. Anxiety, you’re not welcome here anymore.

Light pushed away darkness. Light would ceaselessly drown the darkness at every opportunity if you knew where to look.

Although military training and police work have made an indelible impact on my life—my own personal defining moments—they still haven’t prepared me for the evil that lurks within the mind of a serial killer.

All American Boys

Rashad is absent again today.

That’s the sidewalk graffiti that started it all…

Well, no, actually, a lady tripping over Rashad at the store, making him drop a bag of chips, was what started it all. Because it didn’t matter what Rashad said next—that it was an accident, that he wasn’t stealing—the cop just kept pounding him. Over and over, pummeling him into the pavement. So then Rashad, an ROTC kid with mad art skills, was absent again…and again…stuck in a hospital room. Why? Because it looked like he was stealing. And he was a black kid in baggy clothes. So he must have been stealing.

And that’s how it started.

And that’s what Quinn, a white kid, saw. He saw his best friend’s older brother beating the daylights out of a classmate. At first Quinn doesn’t tell a soul…He’s not even sure he understands it. And does it matter? The whole thing was caught on camera, anyway. But when the school—and nation—start to divide on what happens, blame spreads like wildfire fed by ugly words like “racism” and “police brutality.” Quinn realizes he’s got to understand it, because, bystander or not, he’s a part of history. He just has to figure out what side of history that will be.

Rashad and Quinn—one black, one white, both American—face the unspeakable truth that racism and prejudice didn’t die after the civil rights movement. There’s a future at stake, a future where no one else will have to be absent because of police brutality. They just have to risk everything to change the world.

Cuz that’s how it can end.

This book takes you in alternating perspectives between Rashad and Quinn. I loved being able to be in both kids shoes (so to speak). To see how Rashad felt in the moments when this was happening to him. To see the situation as it happened from Quinn's point of view. Then the aftermath from both sides. Racism is something that is still very prevalent today and I think this book opens an important door to help us white people begin to understand some of the things the black community has been suffering with for a long time. I can tell you it has opened a dialogue with my children. 

The Last Dreamwalker

After her mother’s unexpected death, Layla Hurley must accept that their relationship was always distant and fraught. In the wake of her passing, Layla reconnects with the maternal side of her family—aunts she hasn’t been allowed to visit or speak to for years, and stories she’s never heard. She travels to South Carolina in search of closure, but discovers much more than she bargained for. While her mother harbored dark and disturbing secrets, there is also talk of her inheritance: a piece of land on the Gullah-Geechee island off the shore is now her own.

But Layla inherits more than land. A long-buried mysterious power, dropped through generations of her Gullah ancestors, awakens. Like many women before her, Layla is a dream-walker. She can inhabit and manipulate the dreams of others. As she dives into dark memories of her mother and the history of the island, she’s desperate to hold onto what’s real and untangle it from the looming dread that someone else, someone cloaked in malice, inhabits these dreams too.

No gift is without its consequences, and Layla finds herself thrust in the middle of a nightmare against an enemy that could snatch away her family and her life as she knows it.

While I received a copy of this audiobook in exchange for my review (via netgalley), all opinions remain my own.

Trigger warnings: slavery, racism, violence, mental health

I found this story to be quite compelling. It kept me listening long beyond when I should have turned it off. 

I wanted to know what was going to happen to Layla and her island. This story also goes back to the viewpoints of Layla's ancestors and you see how the island came to be theirs. The idea of dream-walking is something that I have always been fascinated with and this book just brought the idea to life. It is a new twist on a very old concept. One thing I also loved was the way the family related to each other. Felt like a real family dynamic. We aren't all like the classic TV family, this shows that we can still function, even if we aren't perfect.

The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian

Bestselling author Sherman Alexie tells the story of Junior, a budding cartoonist growing up on the Spokane Indian Reservation. Determined to take his future into his own hands, Junior leaves his troubled school on the rez to attend an all-white farm town high school where the only other Indian is the school mascot.

Heartbreaking, funny, and beautifully written, The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian, which is based on the author's own experiences, coupled with poignant drawings by Ellen Forney that reflect the character's art, chronicles the contemporary adolescence of one Native American boy as he attempts to break away from the life he was destined to live.

With a foreward by Markus Zusak & interviews with Sherman Alexie and Ellen Forney

This was not what I was expecting. 

It was less a streamlined story and more of a collection of short stories about Alexie's life growing up. While it did seem to come together at the end, at the beginning it felt quite broken up. 

This is another that I wish I had the physical book copy, since it has illustrations, but it was still a good book. Interesting look at how the Native American people are still dealing with social injustice and prejudice. Alexie was great at reflecting his emotions into his writing, while at times I cried for him other times I actually laughed out loud. Definitely a good read to see life from another perspective.

The Hate U Give

Sixteen-year-old Starr Carter moves between two worlds: the poor neighborhood where she lives and the fancy suburban prep school she attends. The uneasy balance between these worlds is shattered when Starr witnesses the fatal shooting of her childhood best friend Khalil at the hands of a police officer. Khalil was unarmed.

Soon afterward, his death is a national headline. Some are calling him a thug, maybe even a drug dealer and a gangbanger. Protesters are taking to the streets in Khalil’s name. Some cops and the local drug lord try to intimidate Starr and her family. What everyone wants to know is: what really went down that night? And the only person alive who can answer that is Starr.

But what Starr does—or does not—say could upend her community. It could also endanger her life.

Inspired by the Black Lives Matter movement, this is a powerful and gripping YA novel about one girl's struggle for justice.

Trigger warnings: shooting deaths, gang violence, racism, adult language, drug use, drinking

My rating: five out of five stars

This book was a powerful read. I cried repeatedly listening to this audiobook. 

A story about a girl who witnesses the death of her friend at the hands of a police officer is all too relevant today's climate. 

As a white person, it is hard to imagine, but this author does an amazing job of putting you into the shoes of this black young person, seeing the world through her eyes.

Sea Trials: Around the World with Duct Tape and Bailing Wire

A shipwreck might end a dream of circumnavigating the globe. Not for the Wilcox family. To triumph, they must rebuild their boat on a remote Pacific island. Damage sustained on the reef and a lack of resources haunt them the rest of the way around the world as they face daunting obstacles, including wild weather, pirates, gun boats, mines and thieves, plus pesky bureaucrats and cockroaches as stubborn as the family. Without a working engine and no way to communicate with the outside world, they struggle to reach home before their broken rig comes crashing down and they run out of food in a trial that tests them to their limits.

While I received a copy of this audiobook in exchange for a review, all opinions remain my own.

I must admit, I have never read a book about a round the world journey on a boat, and most definitely not one done by a family! The beginning sounded just delightful but then it turned bad quickly and didn't ever get better. for them.... I appreciated how real and authentic the story was. You got to feel what they were really going through, what they were really feeling in those long days on the boat. Even with no knowledge of sailboats, I was able to understand the lingo and know what was going on. I really enjoyed that you got to know what happened to each family member after their journey. I often wonder about things like that.

This narrator was fantastic. You could feel how the family was feeling.

The Lady's Guide to Death & Deception

What is a spy willing to do when both her heart and her country are at risk?

Life changes once again for British spy Miss Mary Bennet when Napoleon Bonaparte escapes from the Isle of Elba. Mary quickly departs England for Brussels, the city where the Allied forces prepare for war against the French. But shortly after her arrival, one of the Duke of Wellington’s best officers is murdered, an event which threatens to break the delicate alliance between the Allies.

Investigating the murder forces Mary into precarious levels of espionage, role-playing, and deception with her new partner, Mr. Withrow—the nephew and heir of her prominent sponsor, and the spy with whom she’s often at odds. Together, they court danger and discovery as they play dual roles gathering intelligence for the British. But soon Mary realizes that her growing feelings towards Mr. Withrow put her heart in as much danger as her life. And then there’s another murder.

Mary will need to unmask the murderer before more people are killed, but can she do so and remain hidden in the background?

Although I received a copy of this audiobook (via netgalley) in exchange for my review, all opinions remain my own.

Trigger warnings: descriptions of wartime violence and domestic violence.

I have been loving the historical fiction lately. This one takes place way, way back in the times of Napoleon Bonaparte. Our main character, Mary Bennet, is a spy. I love that she is a female spy in the times when females weren't trusted to do much of anything.

What I didn't realize until sitting down to write this review is that this is part of a series. I love that I was able to pick this book up, read it in its entirety and understand it completely without having read the first two installments. Nor will I need to read anymore of the series to get the ending. It is a complete story all on its own.

The characters are relatable, despite their place in such a backwards time period. Cowley does an amazing job weaving real life events into the story such as the battle of Waterloo. I would totally read more books by this author.

The Matchmaker's Gift

From Lynda Cohen Loigman, the bestselling author of The Two-Family House and The Wartime Sisters, comes a heartwarming story of two extraordinary women from two different eras who defy expectations to utilize their unique gift of seeing soulmates in the most unexpected places in The Matchmaker's Gift.

Is finding true love a calling or a curse?

Even as a child in 1910, Sara Glikman knows her gift: she is a maker of matches and a seeker of soulmates. But among the pushcart-crowded streets of New York’s Lower East Side, Sara’s vocation is dominated by devout older men—men who see a talented female matchmaker as a dangerous threat to their traditions and livelihood. After making matches in secret for more than a decade, Sara must fight to take her rightful place among her peers, and to demand the recognition she deserves.

Two generations later, Sara’s granddaughter, Abby, is a successful Manhattan divorce attorney, representing the city’s wealthiest clients. When her beloved Grandma Sara dies, Abby inherits her collection of handwritten journals recording the details of Sara’s matches. But among the faded volumes, Abby finds more questions than answers. Why did Abby’s grandmother leave this library to her and what did she hope Abby would discover within its pages? Why does the work Abby once found so compelling suddenly feel inconsequential and flawed? Is Abby willing to sacrifice the career she’s worked so hard for in order to keep her grandmother’s mysterious promise to a stranger? And is there really such a thing as love at first sight?

Although I received a copy of this audiobook in exchange for my review (via netgalley), all opinions remain my own.

My review: Five stars out of five stars

This story is a journey of two women, Sara Gilkman in the early 1900s and her granddaughter Abby, two generations later. It is told in 

I loved every chapter of this book. I loved the small bits of magic that were woven into the story. Words can't really capture the feelings I had when reading this book. I loved reading about how Sara made her matches, about how she lived during her lifetime in the 1900s. In an alternating story you see her granddaughter Abby, learning of her beloved grandmothers death, grieving her loss, learning more about her amazing life. You see through both women's eyes, the things that happened.

Then in the end, how things come together. No spoilers, but this is simply a beautiful book. 

The Spanish Love Deception

Catalina Martín desperately needs a date to her sister’s wedding. Especially since her little white lie about her American boyfriend has spiraled out of control. Now everyone she knows—including her ex and his fiancée—will be there and eager to meet him.
She only has four weeks to find someone willing to cross the Atlantic and aid in her deception. New York to Spain is no short flight and her raucous family won’t be easy to fool.

Enter Aaron Blackford—her tall, handsome, condescending colleague—who surprisingly offers to step in. She’d rather refuse; never has there been a more aggravating, blood-boiling, and insufferable man.

But Catalina is desperate, and as the wedding draws nearer, Aaron looks like her best option. And she begins to realize he might not be as terrible in the real world as he is at the office.

My rating: four of five stars

I thought this was a cute book. Parts of it were a little expected, but it wasn't in a bad way. I loved the end of the story though and really love that this is book one. That means there will be more Catalina and Aaron. They are so cute together. TSLD includes several racy love scenes, so if those aren't your thing, either be prepared to skip a few pages or maybe skip this book. The main characters in this story were loveable and fun. Sometimes you wanted to slap them for the stupid decisions they were making. 

Flawed

Flawed by Cecelia Ahern

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Celestine North lives a perfect life. She’s a model daughter and sister, she’s well-liked by her classmates and teachers, and she’s dating the impossibly charming Art Crevan.

But then Celestine encounters a situation where she makes an instinctive decision. She breaks a rule and now faces life-changing repercussions. She could be imprisoned. She could be branded. She could be found flawed.

In her breathtaking young adult debut, bestselling author Cecelia Ahern depicts a society where perfection is paramount and flaws lead to punishment. And where one young woman decides to take a stand that could cost her everything.

This book is a difficult one to review. The concept is new and different. Basically, a country is striving to perfect it's gene pool, so anyone who makes a grave error of judgement is literally marked as flawed with a brand on their skin. Where the brand goes depends on what kind of error they made.

From the get go I knew that this Flawed system wasn't going to "last." You could see the ways that this would go wrong in so many ways. What happens isn't' what I was expecting at all. I loved the main character. Watching her learn and grow as she learns more about the system was interesting.

Cannot wait to read the next in this series! 

A Bookshop In Berlin

The memoir of a Jewish bookseller on a harrowing fight for survival across Nazi-occupied Europe.
In 1921, Françoise Frenkel--a Jewish woman from Poland--fulfills a dream. She opens La Maison du Livre, Berlin's first French bookshop, attracting artists and diplomats, celebrities and poets. The shop becomes a haven for intellectual exchange as Nazi ideology begins to poison the culturally rich city. In 1935, the scene continues to darken. First come the new bureaucratic hurdles, followed by frequent police visits and book confiscations.

Françoise's dream finally shatters on Kristallnacht in November 1938, as hundreds of Jewish shops and businesses are destroyed. La Maison du Livre is miraculously spared, but fear of persecution eventually forces Françoise on a desperate, lonely flight to Paris. When the city is bombed, she seeks refuge across southern France, witnessing countless horrors: children torn from their parents, mothers throwing themselves under buses. Secreted away from one safe house to the next, Françoise survives at the heroic hands of strangers risking their lives to protect her.

Published quietly in 1945, then rediscovered nearly sixty years later in an attic.

This was a simply beautiful story of survival during WWII. Maybe I'm the only one that never heard of all these other biographies published of survivors and those who lived through these horrific times. This woman was made to flea all over the countryside to avoid capture by the Germans. From Paris to the south of France, from safe house to safe house. Relying on the kindness of strangers to remain free, Francoise takes things day by day. It really is an amazing story. 

The List

The List by Patricia Forde

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I received an advanced copy of this book from the publisher in exchange for an honest review. All opinions remain my own.

In the city of Ark, speech is constrained to five hundred sanctioned words. Speak outside the approved lexicon and face banishment. The exceptions are the Wordsmith and his apprentice Letta, the keepers and archivists of all language in their post-apocalyptic, neo-medieval world.

On the death of her master, Letta is suddenly promoted to Wordsmith, charged with collecting and saving words. But when she uncovers a sinister plan to suppress language and rob Ark’s citizens of their power of speech, she realizes that it’s up to her to save not only words, but culture itself.

Letta is the main character in this book. She is the wordsmith's (basically word keeper) apprentice.

I loved following her journey through this story. From the naïve girl to the one beginning to see the error of Ark's ways. Seeing how she learns things and grows. The way that she is torn between what she's grown up knowing and what she is being presented with. It all felt very real. It is definitely aimed for a bit of a younger reader. The language is simple, but not overly so. It was a captivating story that kept pulling me back into the world of Ark. To me, it was a different spin on the end of the world stories. The more I think on this book, the more I love it. 

View all my reviews

The Fearless Travelers' Guide to Wicked Places

The Fearless Travelers' Guide to Wicked Places by Pete Begler

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Although I received a copy of this ebook from the publisher, all opinions are my own.

Twelve-year-old Nell Perkins knows there is magic at work that she can’t yet understand. Her mother has been taken by witches and turned into a bird. Nell must journey to get her mother back, even if it takes her deep into the Wicked Places — the frightening realm where Nightmares resides. There she must break the spell and stop the witches from turning our world into a living nightmare.

This book was seriously amazing. The writing paints such a vivid picture that I could actually see what was happening. You can see the characters developing from children to fearless travelers, especially the main character, Nell. But you can see it in other characters too. I genuinely hope this book has more to come, but even if it doesn't, the book is amazing standing all on its own. Another thing I wish this book had was some images, even just at the beginning of each chapter. I think it would add to the already amazing imagery.

If you have the opportunity to read this book, I seriously recommend it.

The Surgeon's Daughter

Women's work is a matter of life and death.

Nora Beady, the only female student at a prestigious medical school in Bologna, is a rarity. In the 19th century women are expected to remain at home and raise children, so her unconventional, indelicate ambitions to become a licensed surgeon offend the men around her. Under constant scrutiny, Nora's successes are taken for granted; her mistakes used as proof that women aren't suited to the field.

Everything changes when she allies herself with Magdalena Morenco, the sole female doctor on-staff. Together the two women develop new techniques to improve a groundbreaking surgery: the Cesarean section. It's a highly dangerous procedure and the research is grueling, but even worse is the vitriolic response from men. Most don't trust the findings of women, and many can choose to deny their wives medical care.

Already facing resistance on all sides, Nora is shaken when she meets a patient who will die without the surgery. If the procedure is successful, her work could change the world. But a failure could cost everything: precious lives, Nora's career, and the role women will be allowed to play in medicine.

Rating: 4 out of 5 stars

I have been waiting to read this book since finishing The Girl in His Shadow. This story follows Nora as she goes to Bologna, to medical school. Being the only woman in a male field puts her right in the light for scrutiny and as the description puts it "her mistakes used as proof that women aren't suited to the field." Nora pushes to prove herself and earn her license to practice surgery.

The cases that are discussed in this book, the ones that the fictional character Nora helps with, are based on real cases. That makes the drama all the more real. I felt like I was right there next to her, witnessing history.

I found this an amazing historical story. To imagine the things they used to have to do to bring children into the world (and the other things they had to endure in the name of "practicing medicine!) I love how the author wove the real stories of history into the fantasy of this imagined character. She felt like a real person to me and I love her!

A few quotes I found that I loved: 

"The law cannot change behavior,” pronounced Mrs. Russell. “Nor will it alleviate poverty.”

Unless we try to find ways for ourselves, there won’t be any. 

In the shadows, in the woman’s realm—that is where life happens. 

“If is a terrible word.” He cut her off. “Let’s not use it.”

Accounting is dismal at the best of times and especially now, but your sound decisions will always outweigh your mistakes.

"The pain will be felt in its full power, no matter how long you have kept it at bay."

All Good People Here

This is a book I have been looking forward to and it did not disappoint. This is the synopsis from goodreads: 

In the propulsive debut novel from the host of the #1 true crime podcast "Crime Junkie," a journalist uncovers her hometown’s dark secrets when she becomes obsessed with the unsolved murder of her childhood neighbor—and the disappearance of another girl twenty years later.

Everyone from Wakarusa, Indiana, remembers the case of January Jacobs, who was found dead in a ditch hours after her family awoke to find her gone. Margot Davies was six at the time, the same age as January—and they were next-door neighbors. In the twenty years since, Margot has grown up, moved away, and become a big-city journalist, but she’s always been haunted by the fear that it could’ve been her. And the worst part is, January’s killer has never been brought to justice.

When Margot returns home to help care for her sick uncle, it feels like walking into a time capsule. Wakarusa is exactly how she remembered: genial, stifled, secretive. Then news breaks about five-year-old Natalie Clark from the next town over, who’s gone missing under eerily similar circumstances. With all the old feelings rushing back, Margot vows to find Natalie and solve January’s murder once and for all.

But the police, the family, the townspeople—they all seem to be hiding something. And the deeper Margot digs into Natalie’s disappearance, the more resistance she encounters, and the colder January’s case feels. Could the killer still be out there? Could it be the same person who kidnapped Natalie? And what will it cost to finally discover what truly happened that night?

I will start with a few trigger warnings. This book includes lots of talk of child death and or murder, missing children, abuse of an already deceased animal, violence. This may not cover all triggering topics, read with caution if you are sensitive to this kind of content. 

I really did enjoy reading this story. The pace was fast and kept me really guessing who the "bad guy" was. It was suspenseful without being too much. I think the only thing I didn't love is that the end was so open. While you know what happened, you don't know everything. If you have read it, you know. 

I hate it when that happens. 

I've upgraded this one from my original review to four stars. The open-ish ending didn't change how I felt reading this book. 

Would recommend this to any true crime fans (likely you have heard about it already if you listen to any true crime podcasts).