We Are All Guilty Here - Karin Slaughter

"Welcome to North Falls—a small town where everyone knows everyone. Or so they think.

Until the night of the fireworks. When two teenage girls vanish, and the town ignites.

For Officer Emmy Clifton, it’s personal. She turned away when her best friend's daughter needed help—and now she must bring her home.

But as Emmy combs through the puzzle the girls left behind, she realizes she never really knew them. Nobody did.

Every teenage girl has secrets. But who would kill for them? And what else is the town hiding?"

What Worked for Me:

Just about everything, if I'm being honest. I was a bit hesitant to pick up a 400+ page police procedural read as I find sometimes they can get really slow or repetitive with the investigation elements.  However, I was hooked from pretty much page 1 until the very end.

I loved the character work in this - each of the characters was really well developed and felt like a real person.  I think Slaughter does a great job of really finding the humanity in her characters, even the bad guys, which makes for a very compelling read.  As this is a small town setting, there are a lot of side characters, many of whom are interviewed during the investigation.  Slaughter has such a good writing style for my brain that I was never confused about who was who or how they were connected to the investigation.  While this is only the second Karin Slaughter book I've read, her character development has stood out in both of the reads so I'm looking forward to reading more of her backlist. 

The investigation was really well plotted and I enjoyed that we had so many different suspects and theories during the investigation.  The final solution was not one that I saw coming (I had a very different theory while I was reading) but I think all the pieces fit together perfectly.  There were a few times during the book where the characters would sit down and sort of re-go over the details of the crimes, trying to look at them from different angles or figure out where a new piece of information fit.  This happened just enough to be helpful reminders to the reader but not enough to feel overly hand-holdy.  I really enjoyed that once they did find the solution to the mystery, we got a really detailed recap of the events and how they transpired so we could see what really happened which helped to fill in some gaps. 

What Didn't Work for Me:

There is a pretty significant time jump in this book (12 years), which I didn't mind, but found the character details after the jump to be a little jarring.  Obviously people can change a lot over 12 years, but Slaughter would drop in new character details in such a way that it felt like I should have already known them was a little odd.  It makes sense because the characters we are following would already know these details, but the way they would just be dropped casually into conversations had me doing a few double read overs to make sure I actually read that right.  

Overall, this was a great read that balanced an interesting investigation plot with some really dark details.  It read like a really good episode of a TV crime drama and I was hooked the whole way through.  This is listed as the first book in the North Falls series so I look forward to reading the next book in the series as well as Slaughter's backlist.

The Living and the Dead - Christoffer Carlsson (trans. Rachel Willson-Broyles)

"Small towns sometimes have a voice of their own.

On a snowy winter night in 1999, Sander and Killian leave a house party together outside a small town in rural Sweden. The very best of friends, the two seventeen-year-olds imagine they will remain so forever. But by the next morning, a corpse is found in the trunk of a car, and each boy is a suspect in the murder. Each has something they want to conceal from the police. And from the other.

The hunt for the killer will take more than twenty years. It will see the lead detective leave the force forever. And it won’t end until a second body turns up in similar circumstances, and the tight-knit community’s secrets are finally brought to light."

What Worked for Me:

This was an expertly plotted mystery investigation.  At the beginning, it seemed pretty straightforward and I found myself wondering why this would take 20 years to solve.  I didn't anticipate all the different layers to the crime, characters, and investigation.  I loved that we got to follow the detectives as well as the other characters who were also finding out information from the police and from each other. I think Carlsson does a really great job of drilling down to the human element in this read and I would be interested in reading more of his novels.  

The setting of this rural town in Western Sweden was fantastic and as someone who has never been to any part of Sweden, Carlsson does a great job of describing it in a way that felt very understandable.  There was a sort of feel of 'this could be any rural town' that really made it easy to connect to the story. Since we do have a 20 year time span, it was interesting to see the ways in which the town changed and the ways in which it didn't.  

The pacing was a bit of a slow burn and it took a little longer to start putting pieces together than I was expecting.  Now, this wasn't a problem and I ended up thinking everything paced out just right in the end.  I think I just needed to re-calibrate my mind from the mystery/thrillers I had been reading back to a police procedural mystery.  But I think the slower pacing really allows the reader to sink into the story and get a feel for all the characters. 

This is the 3rd book in the Hallandssviten series, and I had not read the first two books.  Based on the descriptions, they seem to follow different towns in the same area of Sweden and there are mostly different detectives.  It does look like some of the detectives overlap in the books, so it would be interesting to read the series and find the connections.  That being said, I don't feel like I lost out or was confused about anything because I started on book 3.

What Didn't Work for Me:

There were a lot of characters in this read and it took a little while for me to really get a grasp on who everyone was and how they all relate to each other.  There was a list of characters and brief descriptions of their relationships in the beginning of the book, but I read it on an ereader so it wasn't super easy to keep flipping back and forth.  I would say by the 25% mark, I had all the characters straight in my head and didn't have any issues for the rest of the read. 

Overall, this was a great slow burn Nordic Noir read.  It took me a little while to get a handle on all the different characters and their relation to one another, but once I did, I was very much invested.

Thanks to NetGalley and Random House Publishing Group - Hogarth.  Expected publication date is December 2, 2025

The Forest of Missing Girls - Nichelle Giraldes

 

"Lia Gregg always hoped to outgrow her fear of the woods surrounding her childhood home. The dark, menacing trees have long been the site of whispered legends and disappearances of girls like her. But after a breakup sends her back to live with her family, the woods feel more sinister than ever. 

When a teenage girl disappears from their backyard, Lia's childhood fear becomes terrifyingly real. The missing girls are no longer just faces on the news. Now, the danger is closer than she imagined, and her younger sister could be next.

As Lia digs into the disappearances, she begins to suspect her mother knows more about the forest—and the horrors within—than she's letting on. To save her sister and uncover the truth, Lia must confront the secrets lurking in the trees and the darkness they conceal…before it's too late."

What Worked for Me:

Small town creepy history really sold this read to me from the beginning.  I absolutely love small town secrets - the more sinister, the better.  We get to meet a lot of characters as the town begins to search for the missing girl which I immediately tried figuring out who might be involved with the crime. Giraldes does a great job of building tension within the small town because it is more likely than not that someone near by knows what happened or was involved. We get some details about a few of the past disappearances including Lia's memories about the more recent ones.  However, I do wish we had gotten some more lore of the town and the disappearances in the past. 

I loved how the forest worked as its own character.  It was a constant foreboding presence that seemed to follow our characters wherever they went. It was interesting to see Lia's connection with the forest between her good memories of her childhood combined with the sinister feeling that the answer to the missing girls was out there. The other POV in the book also had a connection to the forest that was different than Lia's.  Again, an interesting contrast to the other views we get in the book.

The reveal about what happened to the missing girls really toed the line for me on if it worked or not.  When we first get some hints revealed, I thought for sure I was reading too much into it and that I must be misunderstanding.  But as we got more clarification and the implications of that information became clear, I really enjoyed the direction the book headed in. Giraldes did a great job of really holding the reader's hand the right amount where I felt like "this is weird, but I'm trusting this author knows what she's doing." I do think it won't work for some readers as it is an odd choice, but I really liked it.

What Didn't Work for Me:

I wanted more out of Lia's character.  She felt a little underdeveloped for me but in a way where it was a little like she was acting as a reader stand-in.  It felt like were were told a lot of things about her like her feelings about her mother and relationship with her ex but the way that information impacted her actions throughout the book just didn't quite come together for me.  I was much more interested in her sister as it was her best friend that was taken. 

I really wanted to learn more about the past disappearances and how the town handled (or didn't handle) them.  Despite the current missing girl, the other girls in the past almost seemed to be forgotten and I would have expected Lia's investigation to maybe look more into the past missing girls to try and find a link or pattern. 

Overall, this was a really great atmospheric read.  The small town creepy vibes were well woven throughout the book.  I do wish Lia was a little more developed and for us to get some more information about the past disappearances.

Thanks to NetGalley and Poisoned Pen Press for the ARC.  Publication date was November 11, 2025.

Heads Will Roll - Josh Winning

 

"After sitcom star Willow tweeted herself into infamy and had to be dragged blind-drunk out of a swimming pool, her agent shipped her off to the woodsy and wonderfully anonymous confines of Camp Castaway. Tucked away in the trees of upstate New York, Castaway is a summer camp for adults in desperate need of leaving behind their mistakes, their social media accounts, their lives. No real names, no phones…no way to call for help.

Willow is relieved to find that her fellow campers seem okay. To her shock, her own favorite actress is here, sitting by the campfire and roasting a s’more. And did that jaded writer, Dani, just wink at her? But the peaceful vibe is shattered when a terrifying woman pops shrieking from the wardrobe in Willow’s room. Soon after, one of the campers vanishes. Is Willow about to get cancelled all over again, this time for good?

Soon, terror grips the group, campers begin to lose their heads—literally!—and Willow and her new friends are on the run. As paranoia grows and disturbing past deeds come to light, this escape from their shallow lifestyles might just lead to a set of shallow graves."

What Worked for Me:

The set up for this worked fantastically.  I loved the idea of this 'unplugged' camp where folks can just decompress and disconnect.  It easily solved the problem in modern slashers of the 'why didn't they just call for help' trope and didn't feel overly contrived.  We get a good mix of characters at this camp - all with different reasons for wanting a reset which helped with the balance.  I also enjoyed the fact that since this camp was basically anonymous, there were some good red herrings when it came to figuring out who the killer might be. 

I also loved the folk horror aspect and there were times where I wondered if we were going to get into supernatural horror territory.  I think the legend was a perfect mix of a little over the top combined with plausible.  Like we could 100% see the real story behind the campfire tale.   

What Didn't Work for Me:

I wanted more character development before the bodies started dropping.  I know that is sort of the point of a slasher is that the characters are basically cannon fodder which normally I'm ok with.  However, with how emotional the other characters got at certain deaths, I felt like there was a disconnect between the characters and the reader.   

I felt the social media message was a little heavy handed in this and at times, felt like this was an 'issue' book instead of a slasher that had some commentary on modern day media.  I think maybe that sort of overt messaging would be better suited for maybe a younger YA book.  I think the message is important, but I just didn't need to be hit over the head with it - the overall plot made the point clear enough.

Most of the kills were off page and the characters would find the body afterwards.  I didn't particularly mind this, at first, due to the overall folk horror elements.  However, there was one fantastic fight scene that just made me wish we got of that action on page.  We do get more as the book progresses, mostly due to the fact that our MC is now involved in the action a lot more, but I think maybe some multi-POV so we could see more of this killer would have been fun.

Overall, I think this just ended up in the 'not quite for me' category.  I really liked the set up and setting, but wanted more character development before the bodies started dropping.

Thanks to NetGalley and Penguin Group Putnam for the ARC.  Publication date was July 30, 2024

Everyone This Christmas Has a Secret - Benjamin Stevenson

"My name’s Ernest Cunningham. I used to be a fan of reading Golden Age murder mysteries, until I found myself with a haphazard career getting stuck in the middle of real-life ones. I’d hoped, this Christmas, that any self-respecting murderer would kick their feet up and take it easy over the holidays. I was wrong.

So here I am, backstage at the show of world-famous magician Rylan Blaze, whose benefactor has just been murdered. My suspects are all professional tricksters: masters of the art of misdirection.

THE MAGICIAN, THE ASSISTANT, THE EXECUTIVE, THE HYPNOTIST, THE IDENTICAL TWIN, THE COUNSELLOR, THE TECH

My clues are even more abstract: A suspect covered in blood, without a memory of how it got there. A murder committed without setting foot inside the room where it happens. And an advent calendar. Because, you know, it’s Christmas.

If I can see through the illusions, I know I can solve it. After all, a good murder is just like a magic trick, isn’t it?" 

What Worked for Me

Stevenson is wonderfully consistent in this series, so if you enjoyed the first two books I would say 100% pick this one up as well.  We get the same character voice, fun side characters, and interesting investigation plots.  I really love this series so I want to have each of the books be consistent in these ways so I know that when I pick up one of these books, I get what I wanted.  But please don't take that to mean the books are boring or stale - exactly the opposite.  Stevenson does such a great job being consistent with the foundational elements, such as Ernest's voice, that the mysteries can go a little off the rails and the reader is along for the ride. 

I enjoyed that Ernest had extra 'rules' for us this time around given that this was a Christmas special, not just a normal mystery read.  Stevenson did a good job of really capturing the essence of what a Christmas special is.  This series is set in Australia and I believe Stevenson is Australian (although I'm not 100% sure since I could not confirm on his own website) - while I'm American who consumes a good amount of UK/Aussie TV and books. I do find that the execution of the 'Christmas Special' is slightly different in American media vs these other areas and I don't feel that American media really play up these types of specials. That being said, I think the rules we get about what makes a Christmas Special really hit the nail on the head, at least from my experience with UK TV shows, mostly.  

I was sort of expecting this mystery to be a little easier to solve since the book was a bit shorter so I actually paused a few times while reading to really think over the different characters and motives to see if I could figure it out (since Ernest does always give us all the clues, after all).  I couldn't quite put it all together so I was pleasantly surprised with the solution to the mystery.  I think Stevenson does a fantastic job plotting out these mysteries and the different clues/suspects/red herrings.  So far, each of the three books in the series have each felt completely unique and there hasn't been repeated elements that stick out to me.  These are the types of mystery books that I love to read when I want a classic mystery read where we get some bodies dropping, some clues, and a whole cast of characters to evaluate. 

What Didn't Work For Me

This was more of a novella-length read at 192 pages vs the 384/336 pages of the first two books in the series.  As such, I found the pacing a bit rushed to fit in as many investigation twists and turns that we would get usually.  I also thought that the family connection in this book was a bit underplayed and could have had more emotional depth to it in the same way we got some emotional development in the 2nd book if we had just had more pages to explore. 

Overall, this was another fun installment in the series.  I wish it had been longer and the mystery more involved but as Ernest himself said, this was a Christmas Special episode.  I look forward to the next book in the series. 

Romance Wrap-up October 2025

 Dealing with a Desperate Demon - Charlotte Stein

Stein has hit it out of the park yet again!  I really love this series and how much fun and heart it has.  Nancy and Jack are so immediately obviously into each other but they are both playing it cool for reasons that become apparent as the plot goes on.  They were one of those couples where I could see some readers getting frustrated that they wouldn't just tell each other that they liked the other person, but I think Stein does a good job of giving plenty of explanations as to why so this didn't feel like a miscommunication trope book.  Their chemistry was off the charts and I love the dating lessons that Nancy was giving Jack because he was such a cinnamon roll MMC who just wanted to do a good job.  The chemistry between them was absolutely sizzling and I was glad that they were able to act on that chemistry earlier on in the book than I was expecting. We get more world building with the small town setting and even some cameos of the couple from the first book - which is always fun.  Overall, this was a really fun read and I look forward to more books in the series.

Tropes: Supernatural, Dating Lessons, Single POV, Cinnamon Roll MMC

Series: The Sanctuary for Supernatural Creatures #2

Thanks to NetGalley and St Martin's Press for the ARC.  Publication date was October 7, 2025

My Big Fat Vampire Wedding - Jessica Gadziala

This was a pretty solid book that just didn't quite work out perfectly for my tastes. Based purely on the title - if you liked all the family antics in My Big Fat Greek Wedding - you will like this book.  Unfortunately, I wanted less family and more of our main couple in the book. I get that the whole point of the read is that she a vampire, her whole family are vampires, and he's a human but every time their personal time would get interrupted by someone, I would get frustrated.  Now, that's not to say the family parts were bad or boring - actually I found them to be quite funny and entertaining, but I just thought the balance of the book was leaning a bit too much toward the family antics side.  I thought the chemistry between our two MCs was really great and I loved how their fake dating/marriage of convenience progressed to a real relationship. The spicy scenes were fantastic and really ramped up the romantic tension.  As of now, I can't find any mention of a book 2 in the series, but there were two characters who were certainly set up for one that I would absolutely love to read so I hope we get that book in the future. Overall, this was still a good read, just wish there was a bit less family and a bit more of the main couple.

Tropes: Supernatural, Fake Dating, Marriage of Convenience, Single POV

Series: Standalone

Thanks to NetGalley and Avon Books for the ARC.  Publication date was August 14, 2025