Genre: Mystery
Rating: 4 Stars
Bodie Kane, a successful podcaster and part-time film professor, doesn’t like to dwell on her past – the family tragedy that screwed up her adolescence, her time spent at Granby School, a boarding school in the woods of New Hampshire, and most importantly the murder of her former roommate Thalia King during the spring of her senior year. But when Granby comes calling, asking her to come back and teach a course Bodie is forced to face her past and really take a look at what she thought happened with what really happened. Of course, her trip down the rabbit hole of her memories stirs up a lot of memories that might just hold the key to solving the case.
I want to preface my review of this book by saying that overall I liked this book. It’s an interesting look at how collective memory can change once you’re not actively in a situation and are able to look back at it with the eyes of someone with more experience. It’s also a very interesting and authentic look at just how flawed our justice system was back in the 90s but also how failed it still is in 2023.
At the heart of this book is a case of a girl being murdered and the police royally bungled up the investigation and settled on the easy suspect, the young black athletic trainer despite there being almost little evidence that shows he actually did it. Now, this part of the book is fascinating, probably the most redeeming quality of the book. It’s a great depiction of just how unjust our justice system can be with the cops feeling pressured by the headmaster of the school to quickly wrap up the investigation since their alumni weekend was the following weekend and they wanted to keep the scandal quiet.
There are so many twists and turns as Bodie and her students try to figure out if Omar, the athletic trainer currently sitting in jail, actually did it or if someone else had taken Thalia’s life that I loved every single minute of it. I found myself buying into every theory and seeing how it was possible that each new suspect could’ve done it. I really liked how Bodie herself was almost writing to her main suspect as she went through the investigation and it was fascinating to see how Bodie’s classmates reacted to her stirring up this case and making them take a hard look at their own memories was interesting.
But then Makkai had to add in other levels of complication with Bodie’s own life like stuff with her estranged husband, her obsession with some dude, and her own history that in my opinion made it hard for me to really like Bodie’s character. I’m not sure how it really serves the plot of the story, it almost detracts from it because it feels like a bored middle-aged white woman decides to take on the justice system for attention. There were parts when she was thinking about her affair that it was like she was obsessed with him and I had to force myself to read because I hope that it would ultimately serve a purpose toward the real heart of the book.
There was also the minor issue of not realizing that Bodie was actually speaking to someone with her narration, almost like she was writing a journal or letters for a person to read later on. It was a little confusing until I realized that she was actually narrating to someone but I’m not sure if that was an issue with the book or if I just hadn’t realized it until much later when it’s literally thrown in our faces.
What saved this book for me was the ending. It was the most authentic ending that felt more like reading a newspaper article than a fictional book. I would recommend this book just so you guys can experience the ending that felt like a gut punch.
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