Author: Karin Slaughter

Recent Reads | How to Solve Your Own Murder and The Secrets We Hide

Posted August 26, 2026 / Book Reviews, Recent Reads / 0 Comments
Recent Reads | How to Solve Your Own Murder and The Secrets We Hide

I’ve owned this book for a year or two and thought it sounded like a unique twist on a murder mystery. I don’t think I fully understood that this was more someone else trying to solve a murder of someone else who had a fortune determine how they’d die; I think I was originally thinking it’d be more like Holly Jackson’s latest (which had a great premise but terrible execution for me). Annie is summoned to her Great Aunt Frances’s country estate where she learns that she was killed. In order for her will to be executed and assets divided, Annie and others need to figure out who killed her and why. I liked this but it took me a really long time to settle into the story, which wasn’t great because I started it at the last minute for book club lol. For some reason it felt like an actual historical mystery so it kept taking me out of the story when I couldn’t really place the timeline. My book club wasn’t really a fan of it, as the story was repetitive (especially how many times she said “Great Aunt Frances”) and the characters were overall pretty unlikeable. I thought it was definitely interesting enough to hold my attention and I’m intrigued enough to read additional books in the series. WE ARE ALL GUILTY HERE was one of my favorite books of last year, maybe not rating-wise (I think it was a 4.5 star too) but just from how […]

Recent Reads | The Sun Down Motel and We Are All Guilty Here

Posted October 27, 2025 / Book Reviews, Recent Reads / 0 Comments
Recent Reads | The Sun Down Motel and We Are All Guilty Here

My mystery book club picked this one out for October since it was a spooky paranormal mystery – it was a little out of my comfort zone as a result of that but I enjoyed it! I just don’t read a lot of ghost stories or paranormal mysteries. Simone St. James has been on my TBR for a long time. The book follows two timelines: there’s Viv in the early 80s and her niece Carly in 2017. Viv works the night shift at the Sun Down Motel in a time where lots of girls turn up missing or murdered in the small town of Fell, NY. Viv herself goes missing, which leads to Carly coming to town and trying to figure out what happened to her aunt. It was fairly obvious what was going on about halfway through though; there wasn’t as much suspense or twists as I tend to prefer. The ghosts were a fun aspect – I don’t want to spoil much about them but it was a welcome change from what I expected ghosts to be in a book like this, if that makes sense. The motel and small town settings were really vivid and made the book super enjoyable to read. Overall, really good for spooky season. My book club agreed this should definitely become a show or movie! We all gave it around 4 stars, with the exception of one person. My friend from book club showed up with this book, which she had just […]