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Good morning! How are you doing? I am noticing a change in the quality of light and it really feels like fall is here. Fall, in Southern California is subtle. Last year the months between September and December were glorious. I hope we experience the same weather this year. I snapped this photo from my back yard in the early morning hours. It’s a view that I never tire of.

I am still waiting for My Heart is a Chainsaw to come in from the library. I am on three different library hold lists and #6 in line for two of them but it’s taking forever. So, I picked up Damnation Spring. If I wait too long to read something I will hit a slump so DS it is.

I haven’t pulled out any fall decor yet but my neighbors have. Makes me want to do that this weekend. There are a few who put their Halloween stuff up too. Last year, we set up a table to hand out candy and it was a sad affair. We had very few kids so this year I think it’s going to be crazy! Even with it being on a Sunday the kids will be out and about making up for last year. Looking forward to it.

We have no plans for the weekend but we are always trying to get out and go somewhere. With me being at home all day long, I need to see a different view on the weekend. I did pick up timed tickets for a local museum for Saturday so perhaps that will be a nice trip. I am craving art.

Have a good week!

The Family Plot
By Megan Collins
Atria Books, 9781982163846, August 2021, 320pp.

The Short of It:

The Family Plot is one of those “treat” reads. One that makes you love reading all over again.

The Rest of It:

At twenty-six, Dahlia Lighthouse is haunted by her upbringing. Raised in a secluded island mansion deep in the woods and kept isolated by her true crime-obsessed parents, she is unable to move beyond the disappearance of her twin brother, Andy, when they were sixteen.

After several years away and following her father’s death, Dahlia returns to the house, where the family makes a gruesome discovery: buried in their father’s plot is another body—Andy’s, his skull split open with an ax. ~ Indiebound

Let’s just say that discovering her missing brother’s body in her own backyard is enough to make Dahlia lose all hope in her true-crime obsessed family. Andy was her twin, but he was also everything to her. Basically, the other half of who she was. Losing her brother at the age of sixteen, with his “goodbye” note the only thing left behind, meant that she saw him every time she turned a corner, searched endlessly online for him, and basically lost touch with her two other siblings because they didn’t seem to understand the depth of her loss. They had each other, and she had no one.

When their father dies and they all return home it’s not a happy homecoming at all. Too many memories buried in that house. They were raised by parents who were obsessed with true crime, specifically the local murders which involved many young women, and the killer was never found. Their walls covered with the news of those murders, gruesome pictures and even dioramas that Dahlia’s sister constructed as a way to work through the horror.

When Andy’s body is discovered in their own backyard, Dahlia cannot make sense of it. He’s been gone all this time and yet, he was right there. How did he end up there? Who killed him? Is it related to the other killings on the island?

This was a marvelous read. Fun, twisty, not that predictable. I enjoyed spending time with this quirky family and I could not turn the pages fast enough. I was hoping it would be good but it will probably end up on my fave list at the end of the year. I was happily surprised by how much I loved this one.

Recommend.

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

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