**Many thanks to NetGalley, Shelf Awareness, Berkley, and Ren DeStefano for an ARC of this book! Now available as of 3.21!**
Can murder REALLY run in the family?
Sissy is about to discover whether or not she has what it takes to TRULY run with her sisters. As the third in command (so to speak), up until now her role in the trio has been clean-up artist after her murderous sisters Moody and Iris take out their lovers, moving from town to town and leaving no evidence behind. The group arrives in Arizona, and now it's finally Sissy's turn to step up to the plate and claim her first kill. She finds her mark in Edison, a handsome church goer who is still grieving the loss of his wife...but has an opening in his heart perfect for Sissy...or as he knows her, Jade.
As her perfectly curated romance blossoms, Sissy is surprised when images of exactly HOW she'll murder Edison, and WHERE she'll bury his body are replaced with dreamy romantic fantasies about running away together and leaving her sisters to their own deadly devices. But with this 'blood debt' owed and so many secrets between the three of them, can Sissy abandon 'Jade' AND the sisters who have always had her back to show Edison her TRUE self? Or will the mere threat of betrayal cause Sissy's sisters to take 'Jade' out...for good?
This book has been marketed as an 'up all night thriller', so I'd put it aside hoping for the sort of deliciously devilish narrator found in some of my favorite serial killer thrillers (You, My Lovely Wife) and a page-a-minute read that would hook me from the beginning and leave me exhilarated.
Well...this book is simply not that.
In fact, it's a classic case of an instance where the author tried to write three different books and cram them into one. This is part suspense (I wouldn't call it a thriller), part family drama, with a HEAVY dose of romance...so much so that at times I felt like I was entirely reading a romance novel. A little bizarre for a book that is supposedly a serial killer story.
The other half of this problem is that I had such a hard time buying the characters' motivations, especially Sissy herself. I couldn't understand WHY she wouldn't have just abandoned ship after falling for Edison. Being a witness to ALL of her sisters' murders, but not having taken part in them (and based on details in the book, it would be iffy to even consider her an accessory after the thorough cleanups involved) would have given her more than enough leverage to leave that life behind and put them in jail, if she really felt like it. And yet she feels she owes them somehow...?
The "backstory" provided was muddled at best, and I had a hard time buying the characters based on the little bit of description they received. This is an instance where having multiple narrators COULD have significantly bettered the narrative, but we are stuck with Sissy's perspective from page one till the bitter (and I MEAN bitter) end.
DeStefano also had the option to go down the humorous route and I was at least hoping if this book wouldn't be thrilling, that there would be traces of this in the overall tone, but no such luck. This book is not dark enough to be scary, and not light enough to be satirical, and I feel this is where it suffered the most. There is also just enough overly scientific description of just how you hack up a body and clean up the parts, etc. etc. to demonstrate that DeStefano did her research, but instead of this detail feeling eerie, I felt like I was reading a dry and dusty forensic pathology textbook.
In every tug of war, there is push and pull until one side wins. And in this book, rather than romance or suspense "winning" the day...I think the rope just snapped.
3 stars
Now in paperback!