Quick, Dark Read

I read and reviewed Ms. McCreight’s previous novel in December – I read it in a day and found it to be really interesting. Similarly to the last time I found her work, I was in an airport bookstore, picked it up, and essentially didn’t put it down until I was finished.

The book is told from the perspectives of three women: Molly, a non-profit advocate turned journalist who has one daughter and experienced a stillbirth a couple of years back; Barbara, a ‘perfect mother’ who doesn’t think very highly of Molly and is married to the town’s Police Chief; and Sandy, a 16-year-old whose mother is missing. The premise? A baby has been found dead in the woods on the town University campus, and Molly is sent to cover the story.

There are twists. Some you might see coming, some you might not. The writing is interesting, and the characters are mostly fleshed out.

However, I do see this author as seeming to only be able to write about women as mothers. There’s one grown woman in this book who doesn’t have children, and it comes out it’s because of a hysterectomy. I get that most women have kids, but man, it really stands out when that is the single defining characteristic of all of the adult characters in the book.