Look at me, reviewing a book I just finished yesterday*. I am determined to review all my October books in a timely fashion** so as not to make my backlog problem worse than it already is. (Sigh.) This was sort of a bummer one to start my October spooky reads on because it was all serious and stuff, no fun at all to be had here. But I can’t deny it was very well done.
*But posted here in December, whoops. I finished this in October.
**lol
Ansel Packer is a murderer, some call him a serial killer, and he is on death row currently waiting to be executed. He has twelve hours to live. The book is split between second person POV sections from Ansel as he waits to die, and the majority of the book, told from the POV of three women impacted by Ansel’s actions: his mother, a detective, and his wife’s sister. We experience Ansel’s life from birth to death, but the narrative doesn’t really pass judgment on him, it leaves that to us.
I don’t want to say too much about the point of the book because that would be spoiling it, but I found this actually more interesting to think about than to read, like I do with a lot of literary fiction. This is definitely literary fiction, playing with and commenting on crime tropes. The style is not my favorite, as it is way more interested in the interior life of the characters (at a remove) and the style of the writing than it was the plot.
If you like literary fiction and crime fiction, this is a book for you. I was skeptical of it at the beginning, but the story and themes pulled me in by the end of the book and I ended up really appreciating it for what it was. No mistake, though, the rest of this month is going to be reveling in trashy plotty fun.
[3.75 stars, rounded up]