In the Beautiful Dark
Ratings2
Average rating4.5
A woman investigates a friend’s long-ago murder in a haunting and hopeful novel about the weight of secrets and regrets by the bestselling author of The Wild Road Home and A Light in the Forest.
At Sunny Pines Retirement Community, where the “Sixty-Two and Better!” share their golden years, secrets abound. Some scandalous, some haunting, and some dangerous. For Birdie Allen, a retired business owner and grandmother, her secret is the only thing she’s got left. Getting old isn’t the hardest part about life. It’s the memories from more than fifty years ago of the death of her unrequited love. And Birdie’s abandoned quest to root out the killer.
With retirement comes a lot of time to revisit old ghosts, so when Birdie ties together a string of recent murders, and a woman disappears, she’s drawn into the same chase she gave up decades earlier. But this time she has the help of an eccentric community of eager new friends. And they’re not alone. Restless souls are watching, including Birdie’s lost love, and they sense the danger that lies ahead. They’re not leaving Birdie’s side until she finishes what she set out to do. But will Birdie’s pursuit of a killer finally free her of regrets and allow her to embrace the beauty of the life she’s created?
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Beautiful Execution Of LGBT / Elderly Story Wrapped In Murder Mystery. This was an excellent and beautiful story of several different types of people who don't often play lead roles in stories coming together to create a particularly powerful one.
You've got women loving women - in 1972. You've got a whole group of elderly people living in a retirement community in 2024... along with a much younger recluse living in an RV she parks near the community. And yes, you've even got both cameo and more expansive scenes with different dogs and even a cat.
Payne handles all aspects of this tale with remarkable care and a particular penchant for showing that no matter our backgrounds or where we find ourselves, we all strive for community and family... and often times, we can be our own worst enemies in having them if we aren't careful.
The fact that she was able to bring so much near psychological horror level tension into the tale, and even a brief sprint of (somewhat comedic, though this may have been unintentional) action late in the tale truly shows just how well Payne knows her craft, as everything was done pretty damn close to perfectly.
Yes, this is a slow tale - it moves along at about the pace of the elderly people using walkers that so many of the characters are. But it is also a particularly beautiful one in both the characters it chooses to use and the story being told here.
For those looking for more elderly people in books or more naturally LGBT - without feeling forced or preachy at all - this is absolutely a book you should check out, and I genuinely believe you'll enjoy. If you're a reader that, for whatever reason, *doesn't* want to read about either of those types of characters... eh, this really isn't your book. Just move on in peace rather than one starring it because it has such characters.
Ultimately this really was yet another strong tale from Payne, who has done a phenomenal job throughout her career of creating just such tales.
Very much recommended.
Originally posted at bookanon.com.
I enjoyed this view into a retirement community and seeing the dynamics at play as this group of retirees continue to lead their lives. The characterizations and dialogue keep me reading page after page and I loved the subtle humor at play between all these individuals. But this book is not just about the daily lives, loves, and adventures of Birdy and her core group, there is a mystery that haunts her as well..what happened to her 'friend' Allison who took her own life over 50 years ago. Was her death what she was told, or is here is a killer lurking in the shadows that needs to be discovered and a murder that must be answered for?
This book has a slow start, but this was necessary for this book to truly reach me as a reader and allowed me to fall into this book and understand the characters. Everything needs to be established, questions, relationships, and even the readers own uncertainties to ensure that this book draws the reader in and, in my case, captivated me. Once I was about a third of the way into the book I couldn't put this mystery down.