Review: The Restless Dark

 


While this book isn’t doing anything particularly new or unique, I thought that what it is doing, it does well. In particular, it’s an effective, if not particularly subtle, critique of the true crime genre obsession. It’s set at a true crime podcast’s competition to find the remains of a serial killer (this doesn’t seem like it can possibly be legal for a recent case, but whatever), and over the course of the novel we watch the competitors slowly unravel. Whether it’s a desire for power or romanticizing the killer, the distance between the competitors and the subject of their obsession slowly narrows, and although there’s a supernatural element at play, the reader is left to wonder how much of that unraveling is because of the supernatural and how much is simply the consequence of a culture that idolizes murderers. Balancing this out somewhat, though, is Caroline, who uses true crime as a processing mechanism for her very real trauma. This book does a nice job of walking the line of criticizing true crime in popular culture while also acknowledging the real psychological factors behind the phenomenon.

Beyond the true crime element, it’s also just an effectively tense, eerie story. The Cloudkiss Canyon is a nicely creepy setting, and the characters and their baggage all play off each other really well. Just a solid thriller with meaningful themes.



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