Jennifer Bisbing's Blog
November 20, 2016
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June 23, 2016
Under the Pines Review by Timothy W. Drescher, Ph.D
Under The Pines is not your daddy’s CSI, but it is eight-year old Josie’s, whose father is a forensic scientist and part of the local police force, which makes family relationships a little bit creepy, but also engaging. Oh, yes, Josie also has the ability to see events when no one was present, either a boon for daddy’s work or a complication, not to mention a source of dinner table tension at home.
The novel rides a deep conflict between young Josie’s paranormal abilities and the “adult” world of murder and its associated personal, emotional, and social ripples which give the story its spark and draws the reader on as it follows the clues seen and intuited by Josie. The various relationships create a second level of tension between Josie and her parents and between Josie and her father’s law enforcement colleagues. In other words, in this novel either you can’t trust anybody or you don’t know who you can trust, all of which combines to produce a slightly unsettling, but always interesting read.
The implication here is that no family is normal, all have their quirks and frailties and tensions and even secrets, but in this novel, Bisbing shows us decidedly abnormal crimes and characters. On this basis, rich with potential interpersonal complexities, it would be a delight to see deeper psychological probing into the inner lives of Josie and her parents, a sharpening of the edge separating the scientist father and the home maker mother.
One feels constrained to point out the book’s inadequate proof reading, whose failure allows solecisms to intrude on the story, but that is a relatively minor point in the face of pervasive mysteries—murder, childhood, the ability to see things not witnessed by other people. But at the same time one applauds Bisbing’s writing, especially her sense of plot.
— Timothy W. Drescher, Ph.D
June, 2016
The novel rides a deep conflict between young Josie’s paranormal abilities and the “adult” world of murder and its associated personal, emotional, and social ripples which give the story its spark and draws the reader on as it follows the clues seen and intuited by Josie. The various relationships create a second level of tension between Josie and her parents and between Josie and her father’s law enforcement colleagues. In other words, in this novel either you can’t trust anybody or you don’t know who you can trust, all of which combines to produce a slightly unsettling, but always interesting read.
The implication here is that no family is normal, all have their quirks and frailties and tensions and even secrets, but in this novel, Bisbing shows us decidedly abnormal crimes and characters. On this basis, rich with potential interpersonal complexities, it would be a delight to see deeper psychological probing into the inner lives of Josie and her parents, a sharpening of the edge separating the scientist father and the home maker mother.
One feels constrained to point out the book’s inadequate proof reading, whose failure allows solecisms to intrude on the story, but that is a relatively minor point in the face of pervasive mysteries—murder, childhood, the ability to see things not witnessed by other people. But at the same time one applauds Bisbing’s writing, especially her sense of plot.
— Timothy W. Drescher, Ph.D
June, 2016
