Cleverly plotted, well-paced, and very fun! It'll no doubt be a fun miniseries someday.
I know people like to give Reese Witherspoon shit for her bookCleverly plotted, well-paced, and very fun! It'll no doubt be a fun miniseries someday.
I know people like to give Reese Witherspoon shit for her book club, and I absolutely acknowledge that in recent years the recs have been less reliable than they initially were. But I can say that in each book I've tried, I recognize what drove her/her team to highlight it in the first place, even if it's not necessarily one I liked overall, and there have been quite a few that have been very, very good--and this is one of them. I'm also never going to fault anyone for sincerely championing quality stories about women.
I find the title (and its use within the story) a little clunky, tbh, but have very few quibbles with this one. It has some similar DNA to the author's excellent YA book The Rules for Disappearing, but this transition to adult thrillers is seamlessly done. Since I read very little YA these days, I'm excited to see what she produces next.
Audio Notes: Saskia Maarleveld is one of my favorite audiobook narrators, and here she gives us the entertaining bonus of a distorted, robotic male using a voice disguiser. This kind of thing can be annoying in the wrong hands, but her performance is perfectly rendered....more
Sort of Knives Out-ish, except with less bite. I liked this, but coming to it so soon after several other intricately plotted mysteries with 3.5 stars
Sort of Knives Out-ish, except with less bite. I liked this, but coming to it so soon after several other intricately plotted mysteries with complex characters colored my experience somewhat. I think one of the bigger twists is also telegraphed way too early (for me, pretty much as soon as the book began and then repeatedly reinforced), so when the reveal came more than halfway through it was a bit of a non-event.
I enjoyed Hawkins' trademark humor and sarcastic dialogue, but I do think her character work and plotting in The Villa were sharper and truer and more memorable. I would like to have seen this grand house and estate as more of a character and (perhaps sinister?) setting, too.
Audio Notes: I liked the two female narrators just fine, but I wasn't as keen on the male narrator. The way he voiced the character didn't endear him to me, and a few times the performance felt overly excitable for my taste.
Completely random side note: one of my favorite movies ever ever is The Heiress with Olivia de Havilland and Montgomery Clift, which has nothing to do with this other than its title, sadly. It would be interesting to see a good modern retelling of that ahead-of-its-time feminist story, reworked the way Hawkins did for Mary Shelley + The Villa. (The movie itself is an adaptation of Washington Square.) Just throwing it out there....more
I liked the narrative voice, but this needed more focus, more plotting, more character work, more tension, and a lot more atmosphere. Not at all creepI liked the narrative voice, but this needed more focus, more plotting, more character work, more tension, and a lot more atmosphere. Not at all creepy or gothic, and the human stuff isn’t nearly as poignant as it could be. A debut, however, so it might be interesting to see if the author develops into one to watch. But please, not so many POVs and more showing, less telling.
Audio Notes: I LOVED the narration by Adam Lazarre-White, however. His voice reminds me of a couple of my favorite Headspace sleepcast narrators, and he does different voices and accents—and women and children!—so well....more
Enjoyably low-stakes cozy mysteries (this one with a touch of the supernatural) have become pleasant palate cleansers between more complicate3.5 stars
Enjoyably low-stakes cozy mysteries (this one with a touch of the supernatural) have become pleasant palate cleansers between more complicated thrillers. Sort of the Harlequin Presents to regular romance. ;)
Will definitely read the next one! I liked the audiobook narrator, too....more
I really liked the writing, loved the section about the man who made prosthetic eyes, and appreciated the surprise in the middle, but the plotting shoI really liked the writing, loved the section about the man who made prosthetic eyes, and appreciated the surprise in the middle, but the plotting should have been better. Very little is revealed or wrapped up until the end, whereas dropping better clues and laying more foundation would have made this much stronger. And while I appreciate emotional restraint, this needed a little more oomph in the feels department. It shouldn’t feel as detached as much of it did. Didn’t mind the slowness of it at all, just needed more.
Narrator intones and projects instead of simply reading, which I’m not a fan of. She comes down really hard on words and within 15 minutes or so, it wNarrator intones and projects instead of simply reading, which I’m not a fan of. She comes down really hard on words and within 15 minutes or so, it was hard to differentiate the male voice from the female bartender’s.
I may pick up the regular book at some point. ...more
Completely underbaked. And I don't know that it really had that much to say, except one thing which came very very late and is underdeveloped and undeCompletely underbaked. And I don't know that it really had that much to say, except one thing which came very very late and is underdeveloped and underutilized. This book very much wants to be Where the Crawdads Sing...which I didn't like that much either, haha.
Susan Bennett did a nice job narrating, though. She captures the slow rhythms of southern speech and voices in a compelling way, I just wish she had had more substantial material to work with....more
Listened to about 20%. Liked Catherine Taber as narrator, liked some of the descriptiveness, but eventually felt like it was straining to lean so far Listened to about 20%. Liked Catherine Taber as narrator, liked some of the descriptiveness, but eventually felt like it was straining to lean so far into the literary fiction river that it was falling over the side of its verrrrry slow-moving canoe. Too much deliberate style, too little substance to sit through the entire 17 hours on audio. Maybe the time passes better as a regular read....more
3.5 stars for merit, less than that on personal feeling. General spoilers below, though you can tell most of what’s discussed by reading between the l3.5 stars for merit, less than that on personal feeling. General spoilers below, though you can tell most of what’s discussed by reading between the lines of the dust jacket.
My overall feeling: I don’t need for absolutely everything to be connected.
Over the course of 20+ years, Slaughter has slowly unveiled a lot of shocking information, or revelations about previously unknown facts that lend extra weight and poignancy to the history and relationships we know. She’s done it with incredibly hard scenarios, even circling back with dead characters, and most of the time it’s been done with a judicious, compassionate eye.
But I just couldn’t buy into the number of threads binding everything together in this novel, nor do I think they add significant layers to the existing story. To name just a few, over the years, we went from Faith’s dedication to her job as a cop/GBI agent back to her mom Evelyn’s job as a cop and now Faith’s son Jeremy getting involved in the investigation. Amanda’s ties to Faith and Evelyn have always felt strong, but I didn’t love Criminal’s deep dive into her past, and I have very mixed feelings on Amanda’s ongoing interference in Will’s childhood, career, and present life. It’s all just too conveniently—and not always convincingly—tied together.
Most of all, however, I feel such unease about taking one of the most defining, heart-wrenching moments in Sara Linton’s life—her rape when she was a young doctor—and turning it into part of a organized conspiracy 16 books later. The main plot, centered around a group of men who have a ridiculously regimented rape club, introduces and assembles whole new characters and histories and feels like a lurid CSI: Georgia episode. Does it do her a disservice to relegate this experience to a footnote in their games? Does it change how we look on violent crimes against women? Do her pain and altered life trajectory have further meaning because they’re now been made to be part of a bigger story? The fact is, finding meaning in crime in real life is often a futile exercise. What happens to victims of crime is often all the more tragic precisely because it is so random.
This retconning of Sara’s history feels lacking in genuine purpose and feeling. It really upsets me, actually, even as I appreciate how Slaughter continues to build on Will and Sara together and can acknowledge the technical skill in how the plot unfolds. I don’t know. I feel very unsettled and disappointed, in part because I just went through and reread the entire Grant County and Will Trent series, which are still overall unbeatable thrillers in terms of writing and plotting and character development.
Sara is an incredible character. (view spoiler)[I mean, two books ago, while in captivity, the woman doggedly broke rigor mortis on a corpse’s fingers and then used her fucking teeth to close up the fist again so the hidden message would remain undiscovered. (hide spoiler)] I have not been a fan of how she, who has always been a main character and driving force of these books, has been sidelined in the titles for presumably marketing reasons--they are just as much her books as they are Will’s (and several of the titles refer directly to her). But I didn’t expect that any Slaughter book’s content would ever do the same to Sara's history. Before this book, Sara had come to terms with what had happened to her, and was at peace with the fact that those who knew her did not see her as a victim, but as the tough, kind, intelligent person that she is.
Sara fought hard not to let that one moment define her. But here we are, forcing her to relive her trauma yet again....more
Sister dynamic is well done, but this didn’t really come together for me. Most of the surprises were ones I saw coming and nearly all the rel3.5 stars
Sister dynamic is well done, but this didn’t really come together for me. Most of the surprises were ones I saw coming and nearly all the relationships (mother-daughter, husband-wife, babysitter-child, etc) could have been explored in more depth. The ending felt fitting but could have used a little more punch as well. Compellingly readable prose as always, if a bit repetitive in parts....more
Just think about how many seeds have been planted in the past two decades to make this story. Respectful tip o'the hat, Ms. Slaughter.Just think about how many seeds have been planted in the past two decades to make this story. Respectful tip o'the hat, Ms. Slaughter....more
Precision plotting and tension lead up to a shocking revelation. All throughout, we know Sara has been kidnappStunningly, unbelievably prescient. Wow.
Precision plotting and tension lead up to a shocking revelation. All throughout, we know Sara has been kidnapped along with a CDC officer and they are being held by a loony cult that is planning something big. (view spoiler)[Towards the end, we discover that a large group of men--many of them white supremacists and ex-military--are storming the Georgia Capitol. The Last Widow was published in 2019, which means Slaughter wrote this a minimum of three years before the January 6, 2021 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol. (hide spoiler)] There are so many direct parallels between the lead up to the two events, and when I first realized what was happening, I literally got chills and screamed a little in my bed.
Re-reading in 2023, I appreciate the masterful character work, incredible action, and emotion even more. To be more than two decades into a series (and I do count Grant County + Will Trent as one big series, so please don't @ me) and still deliver so many surprises, revelations, and thrills is an unbelievable feat. Probably my favorite Slaughter book after Triptych....more
Wendy Darling
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