A serial killer recants his long-ago confession regarding a small-town high school girl―and her then-best friends are forced to confront what really happened that night and what’s happening now.

Seaside is a small coastal town, known originally for the local amusement park. But twenty-five years ago, a serial killer dubbed The Carnival Killer confessed to the murder of a local high school girl. Now, he’s recanted that confession.

Barb, Nicolette, and Lorelei were best friends – then they met “Sam” at Wonderland, the local amusement park. After hanging out with him there, and accompanying him to the drive-in movie, where the twenty-something handsome drifter made out with Lorelei in the backseat. That night was the last time Lorelei was seen alive, her murdered body surfacing a couple of days later in a local cranberry bog.

Barb’s dreams of leaving Seaside and becoming a successful writer never materialized and she is a freelancer for the local newspaper and, secretly, writes anonymously about reality tv stars for a hugely successful gossip web-site called Reality Bitch. Specifically, she writes savagely about a long-running show set in Canada called Trophy Wives.

Nicolette left town shortly after Lorelei’s body surfaced, never to return. Ultimately, she married a very rich man, moved to Toronto and rebranded herself as Cole Lennox, one of the stars of Trophy Wives.

With the amusement park about to reopen, revitalizing the dying town of Seaside, the Carnival Killer recants his confession about killing Lorelei, the dead body of young woman washes ashore, and the truth about what happened that night twenty-five years ago – and what is happening now – threatens not only the carefully constructed lives of Barb and Nicolette, but the very fabric of Seaside itself.

I received an advance copy of this book courtesy of the publisher. All thoughts are my own.

I’ve read several Jennifer Hillier books, including Creep, Jar of Hearts, and Wonderland, and genuinely enjoyed all three. That said, her last couple of releases just haven’t landed for me the way her earlier work did, and I’m sad to say this one continues that trend. I went in expecting to love it, especially since it ties directly back to Wonderland, but by the end it just didn’t come together for me.

Twenty five years ago in Seaside, Washington, three inseparable teenage girls met a charming drifter named Sam at the local amusement park. Days later one of the three (Lorelei) turned up dead. It later comes out that Sam was actually the Carnival Killer, responsible for murdering five young women total including Lorelei. Barb and Nicolette (the other two friends), have spent the past twenty five years trying to put that night behind them. Nicolette left for the city, changed her name, and ended up rich and on a reality TV show, while Barb stayed in Seaside and became a local reporter. Both of them think their past is safely behind them. Then the Carnival Killer recants his confession right as Wonderland is about to reopen, and a new body washes up on the shore. He claims he only killed four women, and that he was not responsible for Lorelei’s death. Suddenly old wounds reopen and secrets from that night threaten to unravel both of their carefully built lives.

My biggest issue with this book is that there was simply too much happening at once. The reality TV drama subplot ends up overshadowing the actual central mystery, to the point where it started to feel like the main story was competing with itself for attention. On top of that, there are two separate murder related threads running through the book that I fully expected, or at least really hoped, would converge into something genuinely mind blowing by the end. That convergence never really happens, and the payoff just wasn’t there.

I will say I did appreciate the twist around who actually killed Lorelei. I thought I had that figured out from the very beginning, and I liked that the book took a different route than I expected. Unfortunately, that one strong element wasn’t enough to save the book for me as a whole. If the reality TV drama had been dialed back by about half, and the entire subplot involving the missing girls had been cut out completely (maybe saved for its own separate book down the line) I think this would have felt a lot more focused and cohesive. As it stands, there was just too much competing for space, and none of it got the room it needed to really land.

I did an immersive read on this one, and the full cast recording is genuinely fantastic. The voice actors and production quality are both top notch across the board. I just wish the story underneath all that great narration had been less convoluted.

If you loved Wonderland and are hoping for more of that same tight, focused tension, this one might disappoint you. There’s still plenty of talent on display here, but this particular book just tried to do too much at once.