Title: After Dark with Roxie Clark
Author: Brooke Lauren Davis
Genre: YA Mystery / Thriller
Publication Date: October 4th, 2022
Publisher: Bloomsbury YA
Rating: ⭐⭐⭐
Thank you to the publisher and netgalley for a complimentary earc to review! All opinions are my own.
“Roxie Clark has seen more dead bodies than your average seventeen-year-old. As a member of the supposedly-cursed Clark family, most of her ancestors have met tragic ends, including her own mother. Instead of fearing the curse, however, Roxie has combined her flair for performance and her gruesome family history into a successful ghost tour. But her tour never covers the most recent body she’s seen-her sister Skylar’s boyfriend, Colin Riley, found murdered in a cornfield.
A year after the murder, Roxie’s desperate to help Skylar find closure and start to heal. Instead, Skylar becomes fixated on finding the killer. As the sisters dig into what really happened, they discover that more than one person has been lying about that night. And the closer they get to the truth, the more Roxie starts to wonder if some scary stories might be better left untold.” (Goodreads)
I was looking forward to reading this one after reading her debut last year. I like her writing style and that didn’t change. It was a good mystery/thriller but I didn’t like it as much as I had hoped.
The book is told from third person narrative with the point-of-view following Roxie Clark. She has a unique business when it comes to her ghost tour because it involves all of the women in her family that came before her. Besides being family, the one thing they have in common is the Clark curse. I did like this a lot and enjoyed being told the tales of those that died. It gives it a creepy feel that is different than the mystery.
Roxie was a good character and she finds herself trying to sort through loyalty and understanding her sister who is still grieving. Both sisters, and even their grandma, have dealt with a lot in their lives. It was interesting to see how each one dealt with it. I wish we would have gotten more from grandma though. Roxie’s sister Skylar was not very likeable. I understand that she is still dealing with grief but everything she did was irrational and she was always at arms with her sister.
The other characters, even the brothers, felt like they only had one purpose. I didn’t really feel anything for them and I guess that was fine haha.
The pacing is on the slower side until you get about halfway and the plot is fine but nothing that really grabbed me. It does wrap up nicely by then and I guess I understand the ending but kind of just wanted more from it? It felt a bit rushed.
Overall, this was a good book. I did like certain aspects of the story and will still continue on with this author if and when she writes more.
TheGeekishBrunette 