by Rebecca Makkai
Viking, 2023. 438 pages. Fiction
A successful film professor and podcaster, Bodie Kane is content to forget her past--the family tragedy that marred her adolescence, her four largely miserable years at a New Hampshire boarding school, and the murder of her former roommate, Thalia Keith, in the spring of their senior year. Though the circumstances surrounding Thalia's death and the conviction of the school's athletic trainer, Omar Evans, are hotly debated online, Bodie prefers--needs--to let sleeping dogs lie. But when the Granby School invites her back to teach a course, Bodie is inexorably drawn to the case and its increasingly apparent flaws. In their rush to convict Omar, did the school and the police overlook other suspects? Is the real killer still out there? As she falls down the very rabbit hole she was so determined to avoid, Bodie begins to wonder if she wasn't as much of an outsider at Granby as she'd thought--if, perhaps, back in 1995, she knew something that might have held the key to solving the case.
I Have Some Questions for You Fans shines an uncomfortable light back on our voyeuristic obsession with true-crime. Bodie Kane is generally a reliable narrator, but she’s also manipulative and obsessive, compulsively drawn to the center of Thalia Keith’s story. Author Rebecca Makkai skillfully addresses the complexities of the #MeToo movement, violence against women, racial profiling, and wrongful incarceration while still creating a suspenseful atmosphere and plot. This page-turner will stay with you, and you’ll find yourself thinking of it again the next time true crime case gains a cult following.
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SGR
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