Ranting and Reading Collective discussion

This was such a good book. I loved how it was written, how it was structured, how it was paced. It deals with some tough stuff, abuse, murder, racism, but it's also filled with spooky stuff and it does a good job of balancing the fear. The drama starts at the start and every time you think you can't get more tense, it ramps up and I spent the last 20% of the book in a constant state of tension but yet...it still felt joyful and light in its way. Top recommendation 10/10

Completely agree, I loved this! The persistent pace of the unknown, expecting the worst on every page - and often finding it there, but yet it had a hope strung through it, even at the darkest points.

I loved the Haints weaved in, and whatever Gloria's future visions were, such a great way to explain the history meeting the present (in the past!).

The detail in the description made the people & places seem entirely real to me, brilliantly written.

I happened to watch a documentary about Harper Lee & To Kill A Mockingbird whilst reading this, and it made me think a lot on exactly the experience in small towns, and how Lee publishing that in the 50s when this is set makes me think full circle. The documentary interviewed Black Americans who won't read the book, they lived it. Just how important a white woman publishing that was, how much isn't said and hasn't changed. I am curious what the author thought about that - given she named the nasty dog Scout, I am leaping to a conclusion there.

Although fiction, it is deeply disturbing that this is all based on a real place & the secrets it held until recently, and all only in the last 100 years. I hope things truly will improve one day soon, as the author's comments at the end said, although she put all the evil into one main character, it takes a village for these things to be allowed to happen, and to some degree we are all still looking the other way.