Book Chatter

Nightcrawling
By Leila Mottley
Knopf, 9780593318935, June 2022, 288pp.

The Short of It:

Gritty, but at times lovely.

The Rest of It:

This story unfolds in layers, slowly revealing the beauty at its heart. I have a confession to make though. I finished this book in the midst of all my health stuff and totally forgot to review it. In an attempt to do right by the author, I am writing it now but I finished it early March so I will do my best to recall all the details.

A dazzling novel about a young Black woman who walks the streets of Oakland and stumbles headlong into the failure of its justice system. ~ Indiebound

Kiara and her brother Marcus are doing their best not to get thrown out of their run down apartment in East Oakland. After their mother is sent away for something she did, Kiara frantically tries to rally her brother into getting a job to help pay the rent. Kiara, being a minor, worries every second about being taken away by social services. The only reason she was allowed to stay is because Marcus is of age. But Marcus is far from able to raise Kiara. His lofty ideas on how to make money, which include becoming a famous musician, haven’t panned out and he is reluctant to do actual work. Plus, drugs enter the mix which complicate things.

In addition to caring for herself, she’s trying to keep her nine-year-old neighbor fed and safe when his mother abandons him. This includes paying his rent when she can so that he doesn’t get evicted either. Without a steady stream of income, she can barely do this and no one else seems to be stepping up to help so out of desperation, she begins streetwalking. What begins with one or two paid “favors” quickly becomes something else when local law enforcement wants favors in return for keeping Kiara out of jail. Without a pimp, Kiara has little say in what’s being asked of her. She doesn’t want to end up in jail but she also doesn’t want to end up dead.

My book club read this a couple of months back and had mixed feelings about it. East Oakland is a depressing place. It seemed like everything that could go wrong for Kiara did, but there was also this sense of ownership that she possessed and for that, I had a lot of respect for her character. Oakland, riddled with problems as it was, was still her home. She never gave up on the city. I respected how she carried herself in such a mature way, given that she was just a child herself.

Many things will frustrate you about her situation but there are beautiful moments too. The author was just seventeen herself when this book was written. Unbelievable! Such maturity along with a sense of place. I really liked these characters and highly recommend it.

Source: Purchased
Disclosure: This post contains Indiebound affiliate links.

The Last Word
By Taylor Adams
Published by William Morrow,9780063222892. April 2023, 352 pp

The Short of It:

Relentless.

The Rest of It:

Emma escapes to a secluded beach house with a fully loaded ebook reader, her sweet Golden Retriever, and a backpack full of rocks. From the first pages, it’s clear that she’s battling some demons and a boat load of guilt. She’s also mourning an impossible loss. All she wants to do is read trashy crime books, hang out with her dog and then walk into the ocean with her backpack full of rocks. It’s a simple plan but it’s a plan that quickly falls apart.

After finishing a particularly lame .99 cent ebook, she decides to post a one star review on Amazon. What she doesn’t anticipate is that the author immediately takes offense and tells her so. He demands that she delete the review. Emma finds this ridiculously unreasonable. People are allowed to have opinions and so she adamantly refuses to cave to the request. Who does this guy think he is?

From this point on, the story goes absolutely haywire. Emma begins to hear strange noises in the house and she feels watched. Oddly enough a neighbor at the other end of the Strand befriends her by writing notes back and forth on a whiteboard. They are then viewed by each through a telescope. Emma takes comfort in this stranger’s messages and when things take a crazy turn at the house, she relies on this new friend to watch things from afar.

Is there really a threat? Is she overreacting? Can this author really be so bent over a review that he comes after her? The thing is, he’s a horror writer and the numerous deaths in his stories are grisly and graphic. Painstakingly so. He almost seems to relish “the kill”, so is it really all that far-fetched to think that he could carry that hunger into real life?

Taylor Adams must have had fun writing this one. He jerks you one way, then the other, provides the truth, only for the reader to find out that what he’s just set up is quite the opposite of truth. At first, there was a small piece of me that quickly grew bored with the teasing. A few times I literally cried out, “Really? Come on!” But I gotta tell you, I could not put the dang book down and read it in one sitting.

Plus, I don’t know how he kept it all straight. All the minute details that are revisited later in the story. It’s just wild how it all comes together. The intensity of this one is quite good. My advice to you? Read it, enjoy the craziness of it. Don’t spend too much time trying to critique it. I loved No Exit and this one has that same crazy pace.

Source: Review copy provided by the publisher.
Disclosure: This post contains Indiebound affiliate links.

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