Girl in Snow

Just finished this, this book was not so much of a mystery as it was the insight into the 3 main characters' past! The author (I think this is her 1st novel) I felt, may have spent too much of the book describing the characters past events! David

This was really lovely in ways I didn't expect. The mystery was good, but the exploration of love in its many forms, and the question of what a person will do for someone they love, made this a standout in its genre. A very pleasant surprise.

Girl in Snow A Novel by Danya Kukafka published by Simon & Schuster is a must read for anyone who is in need of a great mystery to read this summer! I was lucky enough to receive an ARC so thank you to Negalley the author and the publishing company. While this is not a 5 star read for me it is a solid 4. The story is centered around a murder of a young girl. Although it reads like a mystery I think the way the author sets up the chapters it is also an in-depth look at the three people from her town whose points of views the story is told from. Jade the insecure girl who hates Lucinda Hayes. Cameron the guy who “watched “ her, and Russ the cop who has his own turmoil that unravels throughout the story who wants nothing more than to bring a killer to justice.
Although this book is strongly based around the murder of this young girl it is also important to talk about how this small-town deal with death grieves the passing of this young girl and ultimately passes blame. The ending and the actual killer is a big shocker and after the first twenty percent this book goes real fast!

I received this book from NetGalley in exchange for my honest opinion. This in no way impacts my review. Written on July 17, 2017.

Content Warnings: Domestic violence, pedophilia, stalking, animal death.

I haven't really been looking forward to writing this review, because I have so many conflicting feelings and am not sure I'll convey them properly–but hey, it's worth a shot. There will be some spoilers in this review, as that is the only way I can properly discuss my thoughts.

The first thing that struck me was how lyrical the writing was. Kukafka has quite a way with words. Regardless of the content, each sentence seemed to flow beautifully and at times the book felt more like poetry than prose. For most of the book, I had on an ambient playlist in the background which only served to reinforce how beautifully written it was.

The second thing that struck me was how uncomfortable I felt about Cameron, who was clearly a stalker. Cameron is portrayed as innocent, well-meaning, lovesick, and mentally ill. He obsessively watches Lucinda at night and draws picture after picture of her. It's clear he means her no harm, but he is still an extremely unsettling character and I felt very uncomfortable with the portrayal of stalking in this book–none of the other characters seem to care at all and it is never damned in any way. Cameron also makes multiple negative judgments about women's bodies that make me extremely uncomfortable and are seemingly without purpose.

Russ is a weak-willed puppet of a police officer. His character development does make him somewhat redeemable, but he covered up the assault and battery that his former partner committed on a young woman, which really doesn't put me in his corner. There are a lot of instances in this book that demonstrate the ability to love someone in spite of what they've done and I think this is meant to be one of those, but I dislike the way it was handled. Russ covers up Lee's crime because he's in love with him, we're led to believe that Lee committed this crime because something happened between Russ and Lee. I don't love the implication that internalized homophobia caused a man to beat a woman to a pulp because he almost held another man's hand. I understand that all the characters are morally grey, but we already have enough poor portrayals of lgbtqia characters and I'm not psyched to see more.

Jade was the only main character I could even stand. She had plenty of faults and was imperfect, but had committed no crimes I could not forgive. Her screenplays were random and kind of annoying, but I understood their purpose. She was also voyeuristic, but in a far more acceptable way. I didn't love her hatred of all other girls, but she seemed to hate everyone indiscriminately, so I gave her a pass on that.

Choosing a star rating was extremely difficult here. I wanted to give it two stars, as I was constantly making faces and shifting around uncomfortably while I read. But I think that discomfort was part of Kukafka's intent. I don't love what she used to achieve it, but I can appreciate that she's a great writer. So I give her three stars for fantastic writing, subtracting the last two for content.