Reviews with content warning for Murder - Catch the Sparrow: A Search for a Sister and the Truth of her Murder

This is a well-written true crime book that will keep your attention. It covers a variety of topics surrounding the murder of Stephanie kupchynsky, including domestic violence and the corruption of police in Greece, NY. It’s well-constructed and engaging. I liked how Stephanie as a victim got to be represented as a full human in the book. Too many true crime books either don’t address the victim at all, or treat them as saintly martyrs. “Her smile lit up the room” is the cliche on any true crime story, and that’s about as much depth as you get. But we get to know Stephanie in this book as a wonderful flawed individual — as we all are! We shouldn’t have to be perfect angels for our deaths to be tragic. She struggled in life, which made her story relatable.

The memoir aspect of the book might turn off readers. Rachel Rear has a very personal connection to this case, and sometimes may project herself onto Stephanie. It does sometimes make you wonder if what’s being told about Stephanie is actually just Rachel’s using Stephanie as a mouthpiece almost. The author really tries hard to convince you of a spiritual connection between the two even if they’d never actually met. However, I do believe there is a connection — how do you live with the family through their greatest tragedy and there *not* be? — so I don’t think it’s insincere, but it might be off-putting to a lot of readers, especially since the author openly admitted to disrespecting Stephanie’s bio-sister’s wishes.

Stephanie’s sister Melanie did not want the details of her murder to be published, but Rachel said she was going to do it anyway.

I really would love to hear Melanie’s (Stephanie’s bio-sister) side of the story.

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3.75

As a young woman who also happens to be a violist, I was entranced by the tragic story of Stephanie, a New England music teacher who was murdered in upstate New York. Her step sister, and author, Rachel, explores the mystery of her sister’s disappearance, reconnects with those who were closest to her in the months and years before her murder, and ultimately arrives at a conclusion regarding the identity of the perpetrator.

Rachel strikes the perfect balance between personal and detached. Having grown up in the same town as Stephanie, and whose mother would eventually marry Stephanie’s grieving father, Stephanie was close to her step-father but she approaches her investigation of Stephanie’s murder with a journalistic sense of detachment from her subject. She never personally knew her step sister, but was, like many of us often are by the family members we never met, absolutely fascinated, and determined that she should attempt to resurrect the cold case of Stephanie’s murder.

While the publisher hails this as a true crime book like no other, even I, a person who reads so few of them, sees the marked similarities across the genre. From podcasts to books, it seems the obsession with cold murder cases is still a strong one in our society. While Rachel investigates as thoroughly as she as able, the conclusion she reaches regarding who murdered her step-sister, rings a bit hollow and is hard to fully accept.

Akin to We Keep the Dead Close, Rachel investigates not only the murder of her step-sister, but also how society treats, and obsesses over, murdered young women, particularly beautiful white women. It’s not only a captivating addition to the true crime/memoir pantheon, but also a worth edition to a sociology and gender studies shelf as well.

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