Hi, friends! Today is my fifteenth wedding anniversary, and I’d planned to write a short tribute to my loving, nearly-perfect husband, but my daughter’s not having it.
So, to get my final post for July live in as little time as possible, I’m sharing a previously-written review of a book I just finished. Next week, I will effuse about the best decision of my life: to marry one of the most wonderful men I’ve ever known.
I enjoyed The Housewarming by Kristin Offiler, which I downloaded through Amazon’s July First Reads.
Told through multiple points of view, this mystery follows estranged friends Callie, Meg, Tess, and Lindsey as they are drawn back together on the five-year anniversary of their friend Zoe’s disappearance. At the same time, zealous true crime podcaster Patricia Adele (who initially ruined their lives in the wake of her own exploitative investigation) also reappears. Patricia has a book about Zoe’s case in the works, and she’s ready to barb them all with fresh questions and provocative new leads, even as Callie, the group’s default leader and original Judas, plans a special housewarming memorial to honor Zoe on Block Island, where the girls had their final summer trip together and where Zoe was last seen.
This novel is the story of four grieving friends still trying to put their lives and, tentatively, their friendships back together. They face opposition not only from Patricia but one another, as each brings her own secrets and confessions to the party.
This book is nearly perfectly paced, as a mystery ought to be. Nothing ever dragged, and I ate up each chapter as the author breadcrumbed tidbits and planted a few effective red herrings. I also enjoyed all the details of the Rhode Island setting—the houses and beaches of Block Island, plus the one-way streets of fancy, touristy Newport, with which I’m familiar.
The novel also does a nice job questioning whether true crime blogs and podcasts are an ethical form of entertainment. Patricia’s desire to feed her own amateur investigations and speculations to her fans drives her intrusive, insensitive behavior, even as it comes from a strange, sad place of personal alienation and has a clearly negative impact on Zoe’s friends and family. It’s a timely, relevant issue, considering how real-life bloggers like Turtleboy affect cases like Karen Read’s. I’m a true crime junkie myself, and the novel made me consider whether my love for these podcasts is in good taste, and whether these influencers pose a real threat to the justice system.
The best thing about The Housewarming, however, is its exploration of and ultimate tribute to female friendships. These women feel real, and my heart broke, then mended, over all the ways their shared tragedy and time both together and apart evolved their relationships, just as it does in real life. This book struck me as a kind of love letter to all the girls’ girls, all those who grew up with a tight-knit group enjoying their own little traditions and intimacies and struggling with their inevitable secrets and betrayals as life reshapes them.
In this spirit, I love how the missing woman, Zoe, is given a voice at the very end, her single chapter creating a bittersweet clarity and poignancy that made my chest ache. Readers find out enough about what truly happened to her, and who Zoe actually was, to feel satisfied, while the story retains a haunting, realistic degree of ambiguity. There is no single, neat bow to tie everything up, and I appreciated that.
My only real nit-pick with this book was my feeling that Patricia the blogger’s story was incomplete. Her point of view is given a chapter once at the beginning and once in the middle, and I wish she’d been allowed one more chapter of her own at the end, perhaps to complete her own arc or provide a glimmer of something she might have learned or how she might change (or not change), or to plant the seed of something she might have realized based on what she witnesses at Callie’s party.
I recommend this thoughtful, seasonal book for anyone who loves mystery and women’s fiction. Congratulations to Kristen Offiler for a strong debut!
What are your summer reading recommendations?
See you all next week!
XOXO,
Jenn
Jennifer Shaw 