Not That I Could Tell by Jessica Strawser
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
A group of neighborhood women gather round the back yard firepit with glasses of wine in hand. By morning one of the women is gone. What is interesting is that the story doesn’t center so much on where she went but why she went.
Not That I Could Tell is a little like Desperate Housewives without quite as much of the drama. I think it’s important that readers understand this is not a thriller, a suspense, or a police procedural. It’s been a little mis-sold with the use of words like ‘shocking turn’ and ‘page-turner’ and ‘twisty’. It really isn’t any of those things, as there’s no question who the ‘baddie’ is, no twisty turns, and no sense of mystery really about what happened to the missing woman.
What it IS is a beautifully written women’s fiction novel centering on relationships with the strong theme of domestic violence woven in. It is very much character-driven with the main characters having such strong and solid internal motivations I completely understood why they made the choices that they did. Fans of Liane Moriarty would enjoy this multi-layered, character-driven novel.
Thank you so much to Netgalley for letting me read Not That I Could Tell by Jessica Strawser in exchange for my honest review.
