After the sweetness of Half a Soul, I decided I needed a dose of murder. Who better than Simone St. James, who not only delivers mystery thrills but supernatural thrills as well. She’s been a favorite of mine and an auto buy author since I read The Sun-Down Motel and her latest was just as exciting.
A young couple find themselves haunted by a string of gruesome murders committed along an old deserted road in this terrifying new novel.
July 1995. April and Eddie have taken a wrong turn. They’re looking for the small resort town where they plan to spend their honeymoon. When they spot what appears to be a lone hitchhiker along the deserted road, they stop to help. But not long after the hitchhiker gets into their car, they see the blood seeping from her jacket and a truck barreling down Atticus Line after them.
When the hitchhiker dies at the local hospital, April and Eddie find themselves in the crosshairs of the Coldlake Falls police. Unexplained murders have been happening along Atticus Line for years and the cops finally have two witnesses who easily become their only suspects. As April and Eddie start to dig into the history of the town and that horrible stretch of road to clear their names, they soon learn that there is something supernatural at work, something that could not only tear the town and its dark secrets apart, but take April and Eddie down with it all.Summary from Goodreads
My Review
Never mind that Simone St. James allowed me to take a trip back to the ‘90s (hello, childhood!) but she also brings grit and bite to the amateur sleuth trope. Innocent, wide-eyed victims of circumstance the two main characters, April and Eddie, they are not, and the dynamic between the two characters, and their pasts, are what drives this murder mystery forward.
I think I mentioned this in my TikTok review, or somewhere, but I would gladly spend another few hours reading about these two characters. Another book. A whole series. They were so engaging and I felt empathy for both immediately and most of all I simply liked them. They were fun and intriguing, and their individual skills and personalities make me think they could hold their own in another mystery down the line.
The mystery itself had all the hallmarks of a Simone St. James murder mystery: nostalgia, heartbreak, spookiness galore, and the gritty intrusion of reality. She delicately balances the darkness with some humor and quirky characters, but never enough to take you completely out of the world she built for you.
The supernatural element, as always, was just enough to be scary but not scary enough to scar. I am not a horror fan, in either books or movies, other than the odd outlier, and Simone St. James walks that perfect tightrope of being spooky enough for the horror lovers but not enough to scare off the scaredy cats - like me.
The nostalgic element, for me, was being able to see the ‘90s through an adults eyes. I was a child during that time, and yet the references, the clothing, the music, the social mores and attitudes, are ingrained in my mind. It was an interesting trip down memory lane.
And, I may be squinting a bit too much, but there are two side characters - teenage girls - who I think of as a grittier, more acerbic homage to Nancy Drew, that teenage darling of YA mysteries. But I could be imagining things. If you read the book, let me know if you see that too.
Being a fan already of Simone St. James, you may call me biased, but she never disappoints, and Murder Road is another great entry in a growing catalog of spectacular novels.