Was this a murder mystery? A character study? A meta exploration on being a writer? Honestly, I'm not sure. All I know is, I couldn't get into it no matter how hard I tried.

On the surface, this appears to be everything I'd enjoy. Four strangers are sharing the same table at the library when a scream rends the air. A woman has been murdered. The scream bonds the four strangers and they become fast friends. But as sinister events continue to dog them and they're unable to shake the shadow of the murder, it's clear one of them is hiding secrets. But which one is it?

Ah, a murder mystery with only a limited number of suspects. I can totally get on board with that. But it quickly becomes obvious that four people, one of whom is the first-person narrator, is too few suspects to sustain a full-length novel. There are only so many possibilities and—unless it was an alien or supernatural interloper who did it, but alas, no— it's hard to feel even a blip of surprise when it's all revealed in the end.

Because the mystery itself moves along quite slowly, we spend a lot of time and focus on the characters. But they're bland at best and unlikable at worst, lacking that all-important appeal that makes character studies come alive. And their actions don't really make sense, often bordering on inappropriate and mostly annoying the heck out of me.

This has the format of a story within a story, which I usually love. But it didn't work here. The outer story, with Hannah authoring the murder mystery, doesn't mesh with the actual inner story itself, and her correspondences with Leo are by far the weakest parts of the whole thing. Every time we get to Leo's letters, which is at the end of every single chapter, I dreaded reading it. Not only was it obnoxious and irrelevant, but it took away from the little forward momentum of an already slow story.

And on top of all that, I didn't really understand the very end. I thought everything had wrapped up, but the last page made it seem like there should've been more. Except I'd definitely reached the end, and what an unsatisfying one it was.

I'm just so confused by my reading experience. So many other readers loved this and found it thrilling and twisty. But I thought it was as dull as a murder mystery can be, with hardly any surprises or twists or even clues. Though it was only 250 pages, I crawled through it for weeks and ended up in the dreaded slump.

Readaroo Rating: 2 stars

My heartfelt thanks for the copy that was provided for my honest and unbiased review.