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A review by pagesplotsandpints
Rabbit Hole by Kate Brody
2.75
Read Completed 10/30/23 | 2.75 stars
This book definitely has an audience but it was not me. It was far darker than I expected but not dark like your average popcorn thriller. I’m not even sure I’d call this a thriller. Teddy was investigating her sister’s cold case and there are some suspenseful moments, but mostly, this is grief and a lot of. Again, has its audience, but I’m not it. Also, I’m not going to go through them all but LOTS of triggers in the book including *multiple* animal deaths, drug use/addiction, suicide, and probably tons more. Please look into this further if need be.
The blurb for this book was very buzz worthy:
“A twisty, sexy debut exploring the dark side of true crime fandom and the blurry lines of female friendship, perfect for fans of Ottessa Moshfegh, Gillian Flynn, My Favorite Murder, and Fleabag
Conspiracy theories from Reddit seduce a disaster-prone woman into an obsession with solving her older sister’s cold-case disappearance”
Firstly, this book was NOT sexy. I didn’t need it to be (or really want it to be tbh). There was a decent amount of sex but it wasn’t sexy. It was messy, mostly angry, lonely, and desperate. None of it was glamorous or glorified. The “blurry lines of female friendship” was also misleading in many ways. I won’t get too into that because I don’t want to get into spoilers but it made me anticipate a different relationship between the two main characters.
Teddy was a hard character to follow. She has a lot of grief to deal with throughout this book but even still… the blurb calls her “disaster-prone” but that makes it sound like things are happening to her. She has had tragic family events but now she’s also on her own downward spiral, and that’s a lot of the book. It’s a bunch investigation into Angie’s disappearance but this doesn’t read like many popular thrillers and readers should be aware of that tone before starting. The investigation is often times uncomfortable and pushing boundaries. Teddy is at the point in her life when she’s losing herself the most and it’s so hard to watch her go down this path, make so many bad decisions, and still want to root for her to have this happy ending by the time the book concludes. It’s so uncomfortable to watch sometimes and I just didn’t know how I wanted her story in this book to end. I thought the ending was a little weird but also made some sense.
I didn’t really like the writing style and I know it’s just not my taste, but I still had a lot of other things I didn’t care for. Spoiler for the ending…We never even actually find out concretely what happened to Angie. Everyone assumes she actually died but there is no villain speech, there is no happy ending. It’s realistic, sure, but as a story, unsatisfying. Then again, from the overall tone of the book, also fitting. I kind of felt like the amount of grief was gratuitous? There was just SO much going on. Angie’s continued disappearance, the father’s suicide, the dog with cancer, a side character who overdosed (actually, more than one), and just even more death and downward spiral. Again, I guess that’s just the theme/vibe here, but this was advertised as a “page turning mystery” so I was just looking for more of that feeling of being riveted, finding clue after clue on Reddit going down the proverbial Rabbit Hole… I didn’t really feel like it gripped me like that. It’s definitely more crime than mystery/thriller…
I was also expecting more of a twisty friendship. There is a twist in there somewhere but some of what I was expecting upfront was behind the scenes and didn’t hit like I wanted it to. From the start, we know there’s something more going on with Mickey but we find little pieces as the story goes on.
I don’t want to rate a book lower just because I didn’t like it when that’s what it was supposed to be, but I’m not picking on it and just rating it low because of what it is — I actually put some points back for this reason. I just don’t feel like rating it higher shows my true feelings about it either. I’m really torn about it. It wasn’t a horrible hook but it was compelling in its own right. There are definitely people who will click with this and I can see it getting some really good buzz, and it will also have the opposite effect on many people. I guess I’ll leave my feelings in the middle.
This book definitely has an audience but it was not me. It was far darker than I expected but not dark like your average popcorn thriller. I’m not even sure I’d call this a thriller. Teddy was investigating her sister’s cold case and there are some suspenseful moments, but mostly, this is grief and a lot of. Again, has its audience, but I’m not it. Also, I’m not going to go through them all but LOTS of triggers in the book including *multiple* animal deaths, drug use/addiction, suicide, and probably tons more. Please look into this further if need be.
The blurb for this book was very buzz worthy:
“A twisty, sexy debut exploring the dark side of true crime fandom and the blurry lines of female friendship, perfect for fans of Ottessa Moshfegh, Gillian Flynn, My Favorite Murder, and Fleabag
Conspiracy theories from Reddit seduce a disaster-prone woman into an obsession with solving her older sister’s cold-case disappearance”
Firstly, this book was NOT sexy. I didn’t need it to be (or really want it to be tbh). There was a decent amount of sex but it wasn’t sexy. It was messy, mostly angry, lonely, and desperate. None of it was glamorous or glorified. The “blurry lines of female friendship” was also misleading in many ways. I won’t get too into that because I don’t want to get into spoilers but it made me anticipate a different relationship between the two main characters.
Teddy was a hard character to follow. She has a lot of grief to deal with throughout this book but even still… the blurb calls her “disaster-prone” but that makes it sound like things are happening to her. She has had tragic family events but now she’s also on her own downward spiral, and that’s a lot of the book. It’s a bunch investigation into Angie’s disappearance but this doesn’t read like many popular thrillers and readers should be aware of that tone before starting. The investigation is often times uncomfortable and pushing boundaries. Teddy is at the point in her life when she’s losing herself the most and it’s so hard to watch her go down this path, make so many bad decisions, and still want to root for her to have this happy ending by the time the book concludes. It’s so uncomfortable to watch sometimes and I just didn’t know how I wanted her story in this book to end. I thought the ending was a little weird but also made some sense.
I didn’t really like the writing style and I know it’s just not my taste, but I still had a lot of other things I didn’t care for. Spoiler for the ending…
I was also expecting more of a twisty friendship. There is a twist in there somewhere but some of what I was expecting upfront was behind the scenes and didn’t hit like I wanted it to. From the start, we know there’s something more going on with Mickey but we find little pieces as the story goes on.
I don’t want to rate a book lower just because I didn’t like it when that’s what it was supposed to be, but I’m not picking on it and just rating it low because of what it is — I actually put some points back for this reason. I just don’t feel like rating it higher shows my true feelings about it either. I’m really torn about it. It wasn’t a horrible hook but it was compelling in its own right. There are definitely people who will click with this and I can see it getting some really good buzz, and it will also have the opposite effect on many people. I guess I’ll leave my feelings in the middle.