Reviews with content warning for Death - The Restless Dark

Reviews tagging 'Death'

The Restless Dark by Erica Waters

15 reviews

bookishmillennial's review

challenging dark emotional mysterious sad tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

disclaimer: I don’t really give starred reviews. I hope my reviews provide enough information to let you know if a book is for you or not. Find me here: https://linktr.ee/bookishmillennial

WHY DID I DECIDE TO READ THIS AT NIGHT ALL ALONE 😭

Anyway, this is a rotating POV of Lucy (the final attempted murder victim of a late serial killer Joseph Kincaid,) and Carolina (who despite her name, trains herself to no longer have a southern accent), who attend a week-long competition hosted by a true crime podcast to find Joseph Kincaid’s remains, which have never been found. They team up with another young woman, Maggie, and all of them begin to notice the darkness and fog take hold of everyone on this trip.

I knew that Maggie was being manipulative and malicious, but I still enjoyed this book and felt satisfied with the ending.

I also appreciated that Lucy was like, ‘yeah sorry this wasn’t a super juicy, sensationalized interview, but I survived something horrible and that’s all there is to it, bye!’ on that final podcast episode.

I do think we should have had either 1 POV or all 3 girls’ POVs so that Maggie’s part wasn’t so obvious, but I still enjoyed as the story unraveling in its own time.

Carolina was so fascinating & we love a queer awakening! I’ll seek out more by this author & would love to see this optioned & adapted on screen.

Content Warnings

nrchambers's review

Go to review page

dark emotional mysterious medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? N/A
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

Content Warnings

herelieshenry's review against another edition

Go to review page

challenging dark reflective tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

As always, I appreciate the way Erica Waters writes characters who are genuinely flawed and imperfect, which feel very human as a result. I also have to reiterate again that she’s adept at writing them into situations and confrontations that stress me out and keep me interested, even when I know (or think I know) what’s coming. In this case, I think it was pretty clear that

something was up with Maggie. In my opinion, using only one POV instead of two would have helped avoid tipping readers off that obviously something is up with Maggie.

In particular,

I think making it Carolina’s perspective instead of Lucy

would have amplified the

unreliable narrator element

and bolstered the moody and uncertain atmosphere of the book a bit more. I also really would have liked if the podcast itself were a more recurring part of the book to give us missing exposition about Kincaid’s other victims and crimes, and give us more of a perspective on how this particular podcast is

exploitative and/or in poor taste

It feels like an underused narrative tool, and I think more of it would have done the book a lot of good; even just showing us

the full episode at the end rather than just a snippet of the transcript would have at least made it feel more present

. The usage of a quirky, unserious title, paired with the disingenuous co-hosts who banter featuring a less than qualified “expert” and someone who postures as being concerned for the people affected, all while sporting a tongue-in-cheek attitude about horrific violence, are all very familiar to me. It’s an unfortunate fact that the true crime podcast industry is oversaturated with that particular kind of podcast (particularly because just about anyone can make them), in contrast to the more “standard” highly produced, serious in tone but often unempathetic, copaganda-leaning podcasts, and the difficult to find but worthwhile podcasts that are more ethical, usually victim-centered or social commentary-based.

To clarify my perspective on true crime when approaching the portrayal of the genre in this novel, here’s an excerpt of my review of the docuseries Ted Bundy: Falling for a Killer (2020) from a couple years ago: “As someone who grew up too acquainted with true crime media, I have a lot of criticisms [regarding] the way murderers, rapists, violent abusers, and the systems & deeply-entrenched sociocultural ideas that enable them to do egregious harm are [frequently] presented in the genre. […] The lack of attention and humanity afforded to the victims & survivors in media and in the way people at large talk about their brutalization is not unique to [any particular] case, but is an incredibly glaring fault in [the popular] framings [of many.]” Ultimately, I do still have an interest in true crime, but I try to be intentional in what I choose to consume and to prioritize works focused on people directly impacted, as well as broader commentary around true crime as a whole or particular cases.

I don’t think this book’s portrayal of it is perfect or all-encompassing, but it does have a reasonable critique and an understanding of breadth of reasons why people may be drawn to it, both sympathetic and unsympathetic ones. Personally, I find that the story itself has a degree of compassion towards (some of) the reasons people may seek out true crime media, even while some of the characters don’t—in particular, I think a major facet of the plot that points to that is

the fact that Maggie is vehemently against true crime and calls it voyeurism, while her entire project and motivation for being there in the first place is voyeuristic

. To me,

her character emphasizes the fact that many people who judge others for having macabre interests, specifically without even considering why someone may have those interests, are often just as guilty of being dehumanizing and unempathetic as the worse corners of the “true crime community”

If this book had surprised me in the way that The River Has Teeth did, I think I would have rated it a little higher, but as it stands, I did ultimately like the book. I do wish the book had put more concentration on its broader themes of nature vs nurture and the complicated issue of violence/justification of violence. The more supernatural element is fine, but I would have liked if it was more subtle and up to interpretation; it feels like putting more of a focus on the Killer Quest event as a structural and thematic guideline for the plot rather than exposition could have made the book that much stronger. I think Waters’s work is always doing something interesting, but if it could just be more concentrated, I would be able to elevate the rating from the lower 4 star range towards a 4.75-5 star rating.

Content Warnings

maddsmann's review against another edition

Go to review page

adventurous dark emotional mysterious reflective sad tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated

4.75

Content Warnings

imskylow's review against another edition

Go to review page

dark emotional mysterious tense slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

1.75

No one should be comparing this to Sadie. This book falls very far below that in my opinion. It’s more girl drama than it is anything mystery or thriller. And there are so many questions I still have. It feels very unrealistic I would say. The whole situation, the fast relationships and fixation on people. All of these girls internal thoughts about eachother made this book drag for me. I wanted more actual action and intrigue rather than ‘does she or does she not like me’ thoughts. It was too long for the amount of actual content this book had.

Content Warnings

ocean_the_reader's review

Go to review page

tense slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.0

The way the author/main characters bash all people who listen to true crime rubbed me the wrong way (as I am a person who does listen to true crime podcasts). Like they made no exceptions. The podcast hosts/fans in this book were terrible, and I'm sure that was the point, however they could have specified that they meant that specific podcast. Plus the mystery ended being super anti-climatic and boring. The book felt too long.

Content Warnings

thewildmageslibrary's review

Go to review page

3.0

Content Warnings

piastri's review

Go to review page

dark mysterious tense

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

3.75

ok so gut reaction straight after finishing was that this is an absolute 5/5, but waiting five minutes made me have other thoughts.

like i do want to say that i really enjoyed this book, the premise was sick asf and i love the true crime elements incorporated with a very needed criticism of the fetishisation of serial killers. also as someone who’s like. terrified of giving into their intrusive thoughts, this really gave me the heebie jeebies so maybe watch out on that front (that was part of why i liked the book so much though)

NO BUT WHY TALK ABOUT THREE GIRLS IN THE SYNOPSIS AND THEN ONLY GIVE TWO POVS. LIKE HELLO??

i do wish the ending hadn’t tried to resolve the book through ~magic~ because that kind of killed the suspense for me right at the end. so i left it feeling a little disappointed.

but yeah it was an enjoyable book! i do recommend it

Content Warnings

nickoliver's review

Go to review page

dark mysterious medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.25

It started out pretty promising, I enjoyed what I was writing, but it went off the rails after a certain point. The truth was obvious from pretty much the beginning -

I mean, come on, three girls in the synopsis but only two POVs? There was no way Maggie was going to be harmless

-, and the characters were irriating and frustrating, especially Lucy. Definitely had a better synopsis than it ended up being, I was a bit disappointed.

Content Warnings

empearl1's review

Go to review page

adventurous challenging dark emotional mysterious sad tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

Content Warnings

More...