Hello hello and welcome or welcome back to my little bookish corner of the internet. Today I’m bringing you my review of an audiobook read recently, True Crime Story. This was suggested to be as a book I’d enjoy by lovely Ericka Walker, author of Dog Days, and she was absolutely right in that a) I enjoyed it, and b) it freaked me right out.
Synopsis
‘What happens to those girls who go missing? What happens to the Zoe Nolans of the world?’
In the early hours of Saturday 17 December 2011, Zoe Nolan, a nineteen-year-old Manchester University student, walked out of a party taking place in the shared accommodation where she had been living for three months.
She was never seen again.
Seven years after her disappearance, struggling writer Evelyn Mitchell finds herself drawn into the mystery. Through interviews with Zoe’s closest friends and family, she begins piecing together what really happened in 2011. But where some versions of events overlap, aligning perfectly with one another, others stand in stark contrast, giving rise to troubling inconsistencies.
Shaken by revelations of Zoe’s secret life, and stalked by a figure from the shadows, Evelyn turns to crime writer Joseph Knox to help make sense of a case where everyone has something to hide.
Zoe Nolan may be missing presumed dead, but her story is only just beginning.
Review
This has proved to be one of the most unexpected reads of my year so far. There were so many twists and turns with this story that I absolutely didn’t see coming, all of it wonderful, and much of it completely terrifying. It was cleverly plotted and wonderfully paced, keeping me on my toes, so that each time I’d relax into the book and close my eyes to listen, I’d find them snapping open at surprise at something.
Ericka recommended this to me after I enjoyed The Appeal. Both books have multiple strands of mystery to unravel, and both are told through alternative narrative. Where The Appeal is told through email and text exchanges, True Crime Story is all about interviews with the people surrounding the missing girl, and emails between the author… and the original author.
True Crime Story was fascinating and compelling, encouraging the reader to look beyond the surface, not to trust what they are being told, and most importantly to keep reaching for something a bit different in the world of crime fiction.
I hope this review has sparked your interest in something a bit different, another unique book to give a go. I’m sure it would be good in any format, but I’d highly recommend this one as an audiobook if you are so inclined as it really lends itself to being told in various voices.
And On She Reads 