Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
When San Francisco copy editor Ivy Hon, the protagonist of this unnerving psychological thriller from Marr (Lies We Bury), learns from a DNA test that she's possibly related to the Full Moon Killer, an FBI agent asks her to help him find the fiend, who "was primarily active in the Pacific Northwest from the late eighties to the early aughts." Ivy, an adoptee who took the DNA test because she suffers from disabling symptoms of a condition her doctor's unable to diagnose, was hoping to find someone in her biological family with the same infirmity who might provide her with insight into its cause and treatment. After locating a cousin living in Rock Island, Wash., Ivy travels there only to discover that her biological mother was murdered by the Full Moon Killer and that the killer has returned to Rock Island and begun a new killing spree. As the evidence pointing to someone in her family grows, the secrets and lies she uncovers put her in danger. After a slow start, the pace picks up and the increasingly tense plot takes turns the reader won't see coming. Marr is a writer to watch. Agent: Jill Marr, Sandra Dijkstra Literary. (May)
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Review by Library Journal Review
Ivy Hon is a biracial--Chinese and white--woman who was adopted as an infant by loving parents in California. Suffering from a mysterious illness, she takes a genetic test hoping to get answers about her biological family. Shortly afterward, the FBI reaches out to Ivy because her DNA is linked to the Full Moon Killer, a serial killer who terrorized the Pacific Northwest during the '80s and '90s. After hearing the news, Ivy connects with one of her white cousins, Lottie, who invites her to visit the family in Washington. During her visit, Ivy senses an apprehension, experiences strange encounters, and feels the need to investigate her family further. Author Marr delivers an intriguing, yet chilling story about what family really means. It questions whether someone a person thinks they know can actually be a stranger. Listeners hear Ivy's perspective of her experiences and that of her white mother's life back in the 1980s. The story becomes more sinister when Samson, a white, troubled individual with a taste for murder, is introduced. VERDICT Listeners will get wrapped up by the narrators as the many layers of secrets within the family are revealed.--Lacey Webster
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Review by Kirkus Book Review
A San Francisco copy editor finally meets her birth family up in Washington under the worst possible circumstances. After Ivy Hon submits her DNA to a testing company, she's delighted to learn that Lottie Montagne, a first cousin she never knew she had, is also on their registry, and she's even more excited when Lottie invites her for a visit so that she can meet her other relatives--though not her mother, Tatum Caine, who vanished shortly after giving birth to Ivy and giving her up for adoption. But the fly in the ointment is a monster: Special Agent Ballo of the FBI tells Ivy that her DNA is also a match for the Full Moon Killer, who's murdered at least eight young women since 1988 and who, after several years off, has recently come roaring back to life. As if it weren't stressful enough to be introducing herself for the first time to her birth relatives--imperious Grandma Aggie; Aggie's ex-cop son, Terry; her sister, Tristen the taxidermist; her disapproving brother, Phillip; and the blessedly normal-seeming Lottie--now Ivy has to wonder which one of them is a serial killer. It's a great setup, but Marr, who zigzags among the viewpoints of Ivy, Tatum, and a third party who seems more and more likely to be the Full Moon Killer, keeps upping the stakes like a compulsive gambler. The childhood secrets! The seductive men! The abusive sex cult! The authority figures who can't be trusted! And on top of everything else, the approach of the full moon! Don't look behind you. Or in front of you. Or off to the side either. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
