Where the Crawdads Sing

I said in my last post that The Night Olivia Fell was the most hyped book on social media, but I might have been wrong. It might be Where the Crawdads Sing. So, obviously, this was next.

My Synopsis: A double story following a young girl growing up alone in a marsh, and a murder in the same marsh years later.

Pairs best with: Grits. But I don’t know how to to make grits, nor do I think I’ve ever had them?? So I made pancakes instead. Obviously with chocolate chips. In retrospect, I wish I had mud cake. Damn it, now I’m mad I didn’t think of that before I took this picture!

Brief Review: 

Though it started slow, this book grew on me as it went. It was beautifully written, with a fast faced ending. My only criticism is the ending just didn’t quite click with me, things felt off. This book is one of the most hyped these days, and I definitely understand why. It combines a lot of different genres in a really well written way.

Extended Review: *SPOILERS BELOW*

So I know that I just said this book was good, and it was! But it had one main thing I really questioned.

The ending. The whole mystery was who killed Chase. Kya was accused and found not guilty, but in the end you find out she did do it. Great – do it! He sucked, and she was (in a nice way) a wild animal – her natural instinct was to protect herself and eliminate the threat. I get that part of it. But the elaborate scheme behind it just didn’t make sense to me. Kya was obviously incredibly smart. She knew the marsh like the back of her hand (what a weird saying) and it doesn’t surprise me at all she could plan a murder and get away with it within those parameters.

What made NO SENSE to me is the elaborate scheme she went through to make a scene of buying a bus ticket, getting on the bus, finding a hotel closer to the bus station, sneaking back into town, luring him into the marsh, killing him, getting back on the bus to the hotel, waking up in the hotel, and faking shock when she got home to find out he died. Really?? A girl who has literally never left the marsh except to go into town to get gas and groceries all of a sudden finds a map of a far away town she happens to get invited to, picks a convenient hotel, and gets a disguise to sneak back and forth!?

There was no evidence, so it makes sense that she didn’t get convicted. I knew the second they said not guilty that she actually was guilty – whatever she was found, I knew the “end twist” was going to be the opposite. There was nothing saying she did it. I just couldn’t get over how out of character the whole scheme was! Between the slow beginning and the ending, I wouldn’t say I loved this book as much as the vast majority.

Loved Tate, though.

Did you read this book? What did you think?