Publisher: Kensington

The debut novel of A. Rae Dunlap, The Resurrectionist is a well-rounded and cleverly crafted historical fiction story revolving around the field of anatomical study and body-snatching in the early 19th century Edinburgh. Despite the story’s macabre content and its almost gothic-like visuals, The Resurrectionist is anything but depressing or grim and is surprisingly warm and animated (yeah, maybe not my best puns, I apologize). While the visual descriptions of the dead and anatomical parts may potentially be off-putting for squeamish readers, the novel doesn’t unnecessarily dwell on it for shock value and is instead the focus is its entertaining and charming coming of age story. While listed officially as a historical fiction novel, The Resurrectionist is just as much a true crime retelling featuring many very real historic people woven in and around Dunlap’s fictional ones. That being said, absolutely no knowledge of the source material is needed, I recommend not reading into it ahead of time as it may give away some spoilers to the story. In fact I was completely unaware of the novel’s true crime angle for majority of my read and was floored when I discovered the connection near the book’s conclusion and author’s acknowledgements.…

After a string of disappointing and underwhelming mystery crime thriller reads picked off of Goodread’s best mystery lists, I picked up Charlie Donlea’s The Girl Who Was Taken on a blind Kindle app recommendation via Amazon’s Prime Reading hoping for something different. And different is what I got. The Girl Who Was Taken reads like a crime documentary reenactment that is colder, calculated, and more developed than many contemporary disappearance novels. The story primarily focuses on two women who work together to solve who is kidnapping young teenage girls across various stateliness and why. Livia Cutty is a forensic pathology student finishing up her fellowship performing daily autopsies whose career choice was inspired by the disappearance and of her younger sister Nicole Cutty. Megan McDonald is an overnight sensation after she miraculously escapes after being held captive in a basement for two weeks and publishes a book summarizing her experience. The twist is that Megan was kidnapped on the same night Nicole went missing, however only Megan was found two weeks later while Nicole is mia. What got my attention from the get-go was how well-researched and meticulous the book is with the details of the investigation and forensic pathology.…