LITANI by Jess Lourey

 

The Amazon Charts bestselling author of Unspeakable Things and Bloodline explores the darkness at the heart of the rural Midwest in a novel inspired by a chilling true crime.

In the summer of ’84, fourteen-year-old Frankie Jubilee is shuttled off to Litani, Minnesota, to live with her estranged mother, a county prosecutor she barely knows. From the start, Frankie senses something uneasy going on in the small town. The locals whisper about The Game, and her mother warns her to stay out of the woods and away from adults.

When a bullying gang of girls invites Frankie to The Game, she accepts, determined to find out what’s really going on in Litani. She’s not the only one becoming paranoid. Hysteria burns through the community. Dark secrets emerge. And Frankie fears that, even in the bright light of day, she might be living among monsters.

MY THOUGHTS

I knew it would be a Weeping Willow. Deep down where my biggest fears are I just knew. I think Jess Lourey will know exactly what I am saying here. Great book. Dark, but still...

This is a hard review for me to write. Not that it wasn't a very good book. It certainly was. Because of the subject matter. This book is sadly based on real events. Things that really happened. From Satan worshipping to child molesting, to pure outright child rape, it happens. It happened in this book but you won't hear details. You won't have to read what actually happened as it was happening. That would be too much. It's covered and told in a way that you know what happened and you cheer when the perpetrators are caught. This is not exactly a scream from fear kind of story. It's an account of one young girl, Frankie Jubilee. The summer she started living with her mother. After as she says, "she murdered her father." 

This story is set in 1984. The summer. When all things child related seem to change. When Frankie starts living with her mother in a small town in Minnesota. When Frankie learns about children being molested and possibly murdered. When she meets three young girls, just children, who bully her. They want her to play a game. They were forced to play this game and it was not nice. Linda Jubilee is the DA in this town. The one who will go after the people who hurt children. You won't like her for a long time but eventually she grows on you. You don't hate her for going after the bad guys, it's that she seems so indifferent to her own daughter that will get you. She is all business. All work. Seems angry. She is angry.

Frankie is a resilient young girl. She makes herself useful in ways most new to town girls would never do. It's a good thing though. She becomes friends with a boy, Chase. He lives in the trailer park alone. He is a bit edgy and hard for Frankie to read most of the time. But he's a good guy. He tries to protect other. Could Frankie have been so wrong about him. All along putting herself in danger? Seems all the bad comes from the trailer park. Or the biggest part. 

There are lots of things in this story that will make your heart ache. It will make you cry. I had no laughter reading this one. I did do a lot of crying. For the children. Linda Jubilee is working for the children. Or is it her own self she wants heard? Does she love the limelight enough to mess up other people's lives? Can she be a mother to young Frankie? And what really happened to Frankie's dad? Did Frankie really murder her own dad and if so why? 

This was a hard book in so many places but one that was so well written. So well researched. Read the beginning. You have to read Author's Note at the beginning to understand that this really happened but is basically written in a fictional town. Fictional characters who you will love and hate. Some will come as a complete surprise others not so much. It was worth reading. It was worth each tear. Each cringe. Each gasp.

Thank you #NetGalley, #JessLourey, #Thomas&Mercer for this ARC. This is my own true thoughts about this book.

5/5 stars and I recommend it. It can be a trigger though. But it's not explicit. It's well written. It's very good.