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“I was not a lovable child, and I’d grown into a deeply unlovable adult. Draw a picture of my soul, and it’d be a scribble with fangs,” says Dark Places anti-heroine Libby Day, who, in 1985, helped a jury convict her 15-year-old brother, Ben, for the ritualistic murders of her mother and sisters.
Twenty-five years later, Libby is not the picture of mental health. She drinks, steals, and lives a vague life funded by donations of well wishers. Now running short of money, she agrees to help the “Kill Club,” a group of true crime fanatics, re-investigate the murders of her family and possibly exonerate Ben, who has a large following of groupies who believe in his innocence.
Dark Places is a psychological thriller and murder mystery with twin storylines. The first of the two builds up to the 1985 murders in Kansas, during a time of Midwest “satanic panic,” while Libby’s mother battles poverty, trying to keep a roof over their heads and food on the table. Readers witness her struggle for survival while raising her daughters and battling with an aloof Ben. The narrative is almost painful to read, since you’ll know from the first few pages of the novel that she and her daughters are destined to be murdered and her son convicted.
The second and even more compelling story is Libby’s: the destruction of her life, her interactions with the “Kill Club,” and the re-investigation of the murders in an attempt to help her brother (and earn a little spare cash in the process), even though she was once so sure of his guilt.
Libby Day is a fascinating anti-heroine, dark and complex, and she’s supported by a cast of characters that readers will alternately love and hate—like Ben Day, whom we meet as a complicated and confused young man. In his youth, he was the kind of odd teenager from whom you’d hide your child when walking down the street. But, as an adult, he’s amassed a cult following of females who seek to prove his innocence and release him from prison.
Mother Patty’s struggle is the struggle of every single mother. Money has run out, and so has her husband. She has four children to raise, including a son who makes her more and more anxious. Meanwhile, Patty’s loss of her family farm is an interesting history lesson about the 1980s Midwest, when corporate farmers and new technology pushed out the small farmer, and men and women like Patty lost their livelihood.
Finally, there’s Runner, the worthless ex-husband, father, and small-time pot dealer who sees nothing wrong with offering a strong word to his family while breezing in to squander what little they have before disappearing when expectations are placed on him.
The book expertly weaves a mystery with hints of drugs, Satanism, poverty, pedophilia, and conspiracy theories. Dark Places will take readers to their very own dark place, but it’s a compelling and suspenseful emotional journey. There’s much hype surrounding author Gillian Flynn’s new novel, Gone Girl, but Dark Places should not be missed by readers who love a well-crafted mystery with an indie feel.
