The mystery was good, though a trifle confusing at the end, but little things kept pulling me out of the story. Narrator says imprisoned relative would not be given family leave to a retreat in Oregon because of danger of escape to Canada. Though entire state of Washington? Retreat was supposedly in eastern Oregon in mountains and forests. Most of eastern Oregon is semi-desert high plains. Mention is made of the forested retreat having been Paiute territory. The Paiutes lived on the high desert. At one point a character declares that she would not have been able to translate product labels printed in Chinese because she does not speak Mandarin or Cantonese--but the whole point of ideographs is that they translate concepts, not the word's pronunciation, and are readable by people of various dialects. It is things like this that pull me out of a story and make me want to hit Google to see whether I am right.

Elle Marr's books just get better and better. ( )

A forest retreat. Isolated. No wireless. A storm. A family of psychopaths. What could possibly go wrong?

The pretty cover of The Family Bones by Elle Marr makes me think romantic suspense. I read the blurb and I thought, this will be a different kind of serial killer story and I was eager to begin reading. It didn’t go like a thought…

The point of view shifts between Olivia, a family member and podcaster searching for answers to the question – nature or nurture, Birdie, and influences and podcaster specializing in missing women, and a Journal.

The mystery begins to ramp up when a body is found floating in the lake. The police are unable to reach them due to the storm and thinking they would be all right. After all, it is a family reunion.

I feel like I am lost in a B movie, unraveling it through the written word. The story felt dry. I thought with the murder(s) it would be more suspenseful, but it just didn’t read that way to me. More of a mystery than a suspense novel.

I will say, there were so many suspects, I would need a murder board to try to figure it out. I know the story is fiction and I am usually able to let the author lead me wherever they want me to go, but this time, I just couldn’t get there. Was it the storyline?…or just me?….

I voluntarily reviewed a free copy of The Family Bones by Elle Marr.

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