really unsure what to rate this. honestly can't even tell if it's good or not, or whether i like or dislike the messaging, or if there is even any coherent messaging at all. i almost feel like there isn't any, intentionally, the same way that everyone in-text feels about the case itself. i did like that the text resisted giving the murderer any sort of neat explanation or characterization that would have fully satisfied a narrative. obviously they were deeply unwell but there was no clean-cut dsm diagnosis there. just a story of how the mind can twist when presented with those circumstances. there are a lot of empty places in the story that we will either never fully know, or where we caught glimpses of possibilities that could have existed in another time but not in the one they were given. i was also pleasantly surprised that this was a ghost story.

the only thing that i can say definitively is that i was hooked and felt compelled to read to the end. and isn't that the one true job of a mystery novel?