This Book Will Bury Me by Ashley Winstead
This Book Will Bury Me
by Ashley Winstead
Mystery | Thriller
480 Pages
Released March 2025
Rating: ★★★★ 1/2
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Content Warnings
Thank you to NetGalley and Sourcebooks Landmark for a copy of this ARC! This twisting mystery was a fun and suspenseful read!
Occasionally a cover will draw me in, and a premise will seal the deal. When I came across this book in NetGalley, I knew immediately I wanted to read it. I am unfamiliar with Ashley Winstead’s other works and was thrilled when the publisher approved my request.
This book follows Jane, a college student in the wake of her father’s unexpected death. Desperate for an escape, she drops out of college and stumbles into the world of true crime forums, where she joins in helping investigate a local murder. Jane’s escapism soon evolves into obsession as a newer and more high-profile murder occurs.
As far as mixed-media “true crime” books go, this was definitely one of the better ones. The books I’ve read in the past were more podcast-focused, so I appreciated the different take using Internet forums as a medium instead. The blend of forums and main character perspective felt smooth and immersive and made this nearly 500 page book a quite quick read!
This book was really fun to read. The beginning of the story immediately pulled me in and I found Jane was intriguing as a main character. I enjoyed the other characters as well, though they were definitely a bit more cliche’ armchair detectives. Another thing that pulled me in was that this novel had a murder that strongly paralleled a very much real-life murder that happened not too long ago so having that real life parallel was also interesting to read.
This book also does a great job of using the unreliable narrator trope, and left me guessing for most of the story. Surprisingly, I actually liked that this story was somewhat predictable towards the end. Usually I see predictability as a drawback but I prefer it in mystery/crime-solving books because I can get a “huzzah, I was right!” moment (which I personally find very satisfying).
My only complaint was there was a part of the book that I didn’t quite understand its purpose but was cleverly reintroduced later in the novel and it wrapped up the story a little too nicely. I think this is one of those books where I would have preferred an ambiguous ending but I may be alone in that feeling.
Overall I really enjoyed this book! The fantastic pacing kept me hooked from start to finish and I definitely want to pick up more of Ashely Winstead’s works now. If you are a mystery or True Crime-esque fan, I highly recommend this one!
This book releases on March 25th, 2025.