Caren Gray, the novel's protagonist, has many regrets: her inability to finish law school due to financial difficulties, her final argument with her mother that led to their estrangement, and last, but not least, her sabotage of the relationship with her daughter's father. These regrets led her back to a place where she never thought she would return.

Caren grew up at Belle Vie plantation, a Louisiana tourist destination where her mother had been a cook. Now, she manages the plantation for the Clancy family, who have owned the property since just after the Civil War. Much to Caren's dismay, she feels quite at home here raising her daughter.

This changes when the body of a migrant farmworker from an adjoining sugar cane operation is found on the property. As it turns out, this murder is tied to the disappearance of one of Caren's ancestors, a former slave who went missing from the plantation in the 1870s.

This novel has so much to love. It's filled with interesting characters, a wonderfully atmospheric setting, subtle commentary on race and class, and a compelling double mystery that truly surprised me. ( )

I just couldn't get in to this book. As other people have said way too many characters to keep track of at the plantation. Very choppy writing questionable editing but ultimately it was a story I was never able to get into. I would like to try the author's first book and see if it was different. ( )

The Cutting Season was a good read. I didn't particularly like the pacing of the book because it took a while to get to a part with action. Eventually, the book picked up for me me during the end of part II and all throughout part III. Part III is when I basically plowed through the book with a grin on my face, which was shortly followed by the awe of how everything that was mentioned in part I had slowly built up to the finale. I couldn't put the book down once the pace started picking up.

I recommend this book to anyone that enjoys historical fiction with pieces of mystery or "who done it."

Overall, I give this book 3.97 stars because of the slow pace, but other than that, I really enjoy joyed reading it whilst listening to the audiobook. The reader for the audiobook had the perfect voice to go with every character. The right amount of southern twang :-). ( )

Excellent. A complicated, conflicted female lead narrates this wide reaching mystery. Family, history, guilt, jealousy and fear play out in a tense, deeply researched fast paced story. I truly enjoyed it. ( )

I really loved this mystery set on a plantation in Louisiana during modern times. The mystery links to a mystery in the narrator's family tree. The resolution is bittersweet, but also just right. ( )