Review: The Alone Time by Elle Marr Narrated by Jennifer Aquino, Christina Ho, Naomi Mayo, and Kenneth Lee

 

Yet another book by one of my favorite authors, Elle Marr. I listened to this on the drive back from visiting my boyfriend at the beginning of summer. I will say, this is not my favorite of Marr's books, unfortunately this one and the one I read before, The Family Bones, just don't match up with the quality of her other books. Still, I enjoyed listening to this book on my way home. 

This book is about two grown women who survived a terrible plane crash that resulted in their parents' deaths and left them alone in the woods when they were children. They referred to this time as the alone time in which they did what they could to survive on their own. 

Fiona, the older sister, becomes an artist as an adult and incorporates her experiences from the alone time into her art. She's just beginning to get the recognition she's been wanting when a documentary director comes to talk to her about her experience in the woods. She's completely against this until her father's alleged mistress comes out of the woodwork claiming to have additional information about the period before the fatal flight. 

Violet, the younger sister, is in college once again after struggling with addiction for a long time. She's become estranged from her sister, but when she's approached by the aforementioned director, she shows up on her sister's doorstep. Together they decide they need to ensure the narrative of their story in the woods needs to be controlled by them which they must do by participating in the documentary. The director claims to be 100% on their side, desiring only to tell their side of the story, but can they really trust him? 

Jumps back in time immediately reveal that despite what the girls said, their parents survived the initial crash and were with them, alive, in the first few days. I quickly began to question why they lied about their parents dying in the crash and what exactly they were hiding about the alone time.

Marr's time jumps are one of the things about her writing that draws me in. It's interesting fitting the past and present together like a puzzle to figure out the truth behind the mystery. I was really hanging on, desperate to figure out what exactly happened, but I will admit I was a bit disappointed in the ending. I feel that the "twist" just didn't match up with the usual surprise of Marr's twists. 

Although I think she has better books, I still really enjoyed listening to this one. It was entertaining and kept me on the edge of my seat wanting to find out the truth. If you're looking for something fun to read or listen to, this may be the book for you. I'm excited to see what Marr writes next. 

As always, happy reading! 

Review: The Family Bones by Elle Marr Narrated by Jesse Vilinsky, Sura Siu, Jennifer Jill Araya, and Arnell Powell

 

If you've read some of my other posts, you'd know that I am a big fan of Elle Marr. Her stories are fascinating and the way her audiobooks are done makes the stories so engaging. This book lived up to those expectations. I especially love that each character has their own narrator, it really makes the story more engaging. 

Following the stories of three different women, a story emerges piece by piece. One narrator, Olivia, is a 22-year-old graduate student (just like me) studying psychopaths due to her family's legacy of being psychopaths. Olivia is disconnected from her family which I definitely think is valid at worst some of them are murderers at best they're extreme narcissists. Olivia's avoidance of her family ends when a postcard comes in the mail telling her the Eriksen family (her family) is having a reunion. Eager to get more evidence for her dissertation, she decides to take herself and her fiance on the trip. The trip takes a turn for the worse on the first night when Olivia's cousin turns up dead in the lake. Immediately family members are suspicious and make guesses about who the murder could be. 

Another narrator is an unidentified woman writing in her diary. She details falling in love with a man she calls Teddy. Everything is going well until suddenly it's not. His family is odd and he is very defensive of them. Her life becomes more and more entangled with his and eventually, she becomes pregnant with his child. She's excited to be a mother, but her child ends up not being exactly what she expected. 

The last narrator is Birdie. Birdie is a true crime podcaster who focuses on the cases of people of color, whose stories are often neglected by the police and media. Based on a tip from an unknown source, Birdie begins investigating the disappearance of Li Ming Na who disappeared from a vacation with her boyfriend. Birdie decides to go to the source and begins going to places Li Ming Na was formerly. She eventually discovers that Li Ming Na was in a relationship with one of the members of the Eriksen family notorious for having a serial killer, patricide, and other less tasteful acts. She keeps digging deeper and eventually finds the place where Li Ming Na went missing. 

The book is also split up into newspaper articles about members of the Eriksen family and the crimes they committed. 

Slowly the story comes together. I was trying to figure out who the murderer was and what happened to Li Ming Na. There were multiple "twists" at the end that had me gasping. I was a little disappointed in the ending, but as a true crime lover, I am always more fascinated when the story is more gruesome (sorry I know that's horrible). 

As far as content warnings go, there are a few, some of which are obvious. There's emotional abuse, murder, violence, violence against animals, sexual content, and more. Please keep this in mind before reading this book. Personally, I recommend listening to the audiobook if you like them. I thoroughly enjoyed this book and hope you will too.