Whisper Down the Lane

So this is based on the true story of the McMartin Pre School Trial, where a parent accused one of the teachers of abusing her child. It started the so called Satanic Panic era in the 1980s. It's an incredibly unsettling read, purely for the fact it could easily happen to anyone at anytime. It just takes someone to start a rumour and you can see online just how quickly something can take hold.

Whisper Down the Lane is based on true events of the 80s, when Satanic culture and fear was running rampant. Everything was being scrutinized as being the work of the Devil from The Smurfs to Dungeons and Dragons. When I saw this book, I was intrigued and ready to dive in.

I was expecting horror more than psychological thriller based on the synopsis. This is not that, in the general sense, this is horror in an entirely different aspect. Children being abused or harmed is a huge fear for parents and Whisper Down the Lane does well in playing off that fear. All it takes is one child...one story...one adult pushing their thoughts onto that child...and all sorts of chaos falls from it.

I haven't read this author before and I enjoyed the writing, flow and story. It took a bit for me to be fully invested but once I got there I flew through the remainder. This would actually make a good one to read during Spooktober. I definitely recommend for true crime fans as it reads more along those lines.

I sincerely appreciate Quirk Books for providing me with a review copy. All opinions expressed herein are mine and mine alone.

Whisper Down the Lane by Clay McLeod Chapman is a chilling tale about identity and the power of stories. Taking the American “Satanic Panic” as it's context, Whisper Down the Lane focuses far more on human evils than supernatural ones. This is by no means to say the book doesn't have eerie and creepy moments, because it definitely does. Overall it was really easy listening. I had a lot of fun listening to this story. Despite liking the book overall it does have a few issues. One problem is that the young characters (age 5) seem very advanced for their age. This may be a necessary device for the storytelling purposes, but several members of the HOWL Society book club (who I read this book with) remarked on this aspect of the book seeming unrealistic. Additionally I thought that the second half, and especially final third, seemed a bit “messy.” The protagonist was somewhat unreliable, but even taking this into consideration there were elements of the book that I thought were never fully developed or paid off, and other aspects of the plot that almost seemed contradictory. Yet, overall this was still a great listen with some scary moments! ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

I enjoyed the story. It was a quick, easy and entertaining read. I like the references to other books and movies in the appendix. I didnt particularly like any of the characters or relate to them but the story was written well and researched well.