Liz thinks she's returning to her hometown to celebrate the wedding of her childhood friend, but instead she uncovers the story behind the sinister and mysterious deaths of several local young Black girls.

Adams is a talented author and great storyteller, but the conclusion to <u>Jackal</u>was just too messy for my taste, and I didn't really appreciate or enjoy the sci fi aspect. <spoiler>I think this story would have been better told as either solely psych/thriller-decades long serial killers-, or all sci fi straight from the beginning. Though Jack's Anubis background became more obvious as the story progressed, it was still just too chaotic for me.</spoiler>Also, this story was bogged down by a mess of unnecessary characters. There were too many names that were mentioned once and then never again. There were several times where I completely forgot characters names, and even a few where I think some had been edited out but accidentally showed up again later. If this story had just been cleaned up some more, it definitely would have been a 4 star read.

Think of Jackal as a mystery/thriller with a twist of horror/fantasy. Normally I like books that blend genres, and I did like Jackal. I just didn't love it as much as I wanted to, given the excellent start, compelling mystery, creepy small town, and the undeniable truths of race and class.

In Erin E. Adams's debut, Jackal is about a Black woman who returns to her mostly white Pennsylvania town where her best friend's daughter goes missing and brings up similar unsolved mysteries of the past.

The book approaches literary fiction stylistically and mid-way through I was convinced this would be one of my Top 3 reads of the year. Unfortunately, the author chooses an unusual path for the climax and it fell flat for me. I know a lot of people love this book from cover to cover, but it just felt likeI had invested in an excellent story that featured a confusing, tacked-on ending that left me questioning too many loose ends.

That said, I still recommend it and I would read her next book in a heartbeat.

Jackal is a story that follows the disappearances of young black girls in Johnstown, Pennsylvania. The story begins with Liz Rocher, a young black woman returning to Johnstown after many years of avoidance. However, when her best friend invites her to her best friend's wedding she cannot avoid her hometown any longer.

Liz is filled with anxiety based on memories and moments in her past and her present that continue to plague her. If not for her friend Mel and Mel's daughter who absolutely adores her, Liz would do whatever she could to avoid Johnstown. Yet Johnstown doesn't leave her much choice of running away anymore when her friend's daughter goes missing. What makes it worse is the girl ends up disappearing while Liz was watching her.

Jackal spirals and twists between thriller and fantasy. I fail to label it as a horror book because to me it didn't give that complete vibe of true horror. Yes young, black girls are being murdered in visceral ways but it plays out more like a true crime investigation than a horror novel.

I have to say honestly Jackal intrigued me for the fact that my family grew up around Johnstown, PA. The story and combination of tales parents tell their children to keep them out of the woods certainly peaked my interest. Still like the heart that is not present in the Jackal, the story is missing something. To me it is not truly fleshed out and in some cases towards the end appeared rushed.

It is hard to determine where the line is drawn from fact and fiction, folklore and evidence. With being around Johnstown for a good portion of my life, I never was witness to any signs of racism in the town. True it is a very white community but I was never privy to any experiences where I saw someone being subjected to different treatment because of the color of their skin. Just the notion of such happening where I am familiar makes me even more curious to uncover the truth.

All together Jackal was an intriguing read. Adams blends an almost folklore take of why things go wrong and why people may turn violent with the reality that sometimes people are just evil. It isn't the best book out there when it comes to the topics it presents to the reader , but it still is a unique read. Until next time, happy reading!

3.5 ⭐️‘s
This book is struggling to find its genre. Is it thriller, police procedural or horror? I, too, was all over the place with this book, I liked it, I loved it AND I hated it. A book that’s not going to be on my favorites list. Thank you to Random House and NetGalley for an ARC of this book.

I might not be entirely sure of what I just read, but I know that I loved it! Jackal is Erin E. Adams's debut novel, and it is simply put, a bizarre and genius story about black girls going missing. Liz is at the center of our story, and she is such an incredibly complex and real character. There are so many genres mixed in here, and it is literature, mystery, horror, and a little suspense all rolled into one wild and thought-provoking book. The ending is what got a little confusing for me, and there was a real or imagined supernatural element that I could never figure out. This has a really dark plotline and is gory as well so I wouldn't say it is for the faint of heart. Adams touches on a large array of social topics such as racism, poverty, and more, and there is a heck of a lot packed into these 318 pages.

The mystery really surprised me, and I had absolutely no idea how this one was going to end. It all came together in a major way, and there were a few times that my heart was absolutely racing. Technically Liz isn't our only narrator, and I can't even tell you how interesting and creepy that made the storyline. I was also personally a huge fan of the audiobook, and both Sandra Okuboyejo & William DeMeritt were impeccable narrators. There wasn't anything I didn't like about them, or the audio and I would highly recommend listening to Jackal if you are so inclined. This obviously isn't going to be a book for everyone, so I think you will need to be mindful of that before picking it up. It is strange at times and it was hard for me to comprehend the extent of everything that was going on, but that, of course, is a me problem and not everyone will feel this way. I would recommend Jackal to horror and mystery readers that crave dark storylines and emotive content.

Thank you to the publishers for my complimentary listening and reader copies of this book. All opinions and thoughts are my own.

Somehow I picked up Jackal right after finishing Darling by Mercedes M. Yardley, and the former has a lot of the same themes and plot lines that I disliked in the latter. A missing child, a serial killer, a small town with a dark past, and a story that focuses far too much on the search for the child and not enough on whatever is supposed to be scary/frightening/horror-esque about the novel.

Jackal has a lot of promise, but I felt that it failed to live up to its potential. A great opportunity for meditation on race relations in small town history took a backseat to the protagonist's obsessive search for her best friend's missing daughter and her own bumbling through her love life. The supernatural aspect, not-so-subtly hinted at throughout the novel in aside chapters, still managed to come out of left field at the end of the book. I love a weird supernatural bent, but this felt unnecessary and too little, too late. The serial killer plot and the civil rights angle were plenty.

I found the writing difficult to get into as well. Liz's thoughts, the way she spoke, the way she prioritized things, none of it made sense to me. It was like I was skimming the surface of her character, skating on thick ice and unable to break through to her motivations and logic. Things just weren't described or plotted in a way that made sense to my brain, which made for a frustrating read.

Jackal was such an interesting read because it crosses horror, thriller, and mystery all together. It was beautifully written.

The beginning captivated me, but as the story went on I was slowly not enjoying my time reading. I loved the discussions on racism and classism weaved in the book.

A fantastic debut that will have me keeping an eye out for Adams's next release. Social commentary weaved throughout the read in a thoughtful matter. Mystery, suspense and horror. Surprised to see so many people not liking the fact that this went in a horror direction when it's sold in that genre. The ending will definitely be a hit or miss for some people but it worked for me.

Published by Bantam on October 4, 2022

Alice Walker was ten before she realized that her skin color differed from her peers. Alice was killed in 1986, soon after she made that discovery. Her death in the woods was deemed accidental. Alice’s heart had been removed from her chest, an inconvenient fact that authorities attributed to “animal activity.” Keisha Woodson suffered a similar death in the same woods in 2002. Morgan Daniels disappeared in 1994. They aren’t the only black girls who lost their hearts in the woods, but the police in Johnstown fail to notice a pattern.

Liz Rocher’s mother is Haitian. Liz was born in 1985, the year the first black girl disappeared in the woods. Liz had a bad experience of her own in the woods on the day Keisha disappeared. Liz remembers an encounter with a monster in a shadow (or maybe it was a dog), but her mind might have constructed a false memory to protect her from the truth. Melissa Parker helped Liz find her way out of the woods that day.

Liz returns to Johnstown in 2017. She has bad memories of the school where she was labeled an oreo, too white in her manner of speech for the black kids, too black in appearance for the white kids. Her teachers believed black people were “an alien anomaly in white suburban perfection.” Her only friend was Melissa, a white girl who didn’t have the looks or money to fit in with the other white girls. Liz left Johnstown because too many people in town could only look at her “in a way that makes themselves feel superior.”

Liz only returns because Melissa is finally getting married to her boyfriend, Garrett Washington. They have a daughter named Caroline. Melissa’s father was skeptical of his daughter’s decision to have a baby with a black man, but he finally decided to meet his granddaughter after he bonded with Garrett while hunting for deer.

The wedding reception is at the edge of the woods. Liz is supposed to be keeping an eye on Caroline, but Caroline disappears while Liz is getting drinks. Liz looks in the woods when she can’t find Caroline and finds a bloody piece of Caroline’s party dress.

With that setup, the story addresses “missing child” themes that are common to crime novels. The story adds a reasonably creative mix of horror themes (don’t peer into shadows; Liz has bright eyes that signal someone who has been touched by the woods). Racial and historical themes add powerful context to the plot. In 1923, the mayor of Johnstown ordered more than 2,000 African Americans and Mexican immigrants to leave the city. Liz wonders how she could have grown up in the city without learning that fact. It’s the side of American history that white supremacists don’t want schools to teach, but it belongs with the St. Louis race riots and the Tulsa race massacre as a moment in American history that every child should study. Jackal is in part a horror novel, but what happened in those cities is the true horror.

The story offers several suspects who may be involved in the disappearance of Caroline and/or all the other missing black girls, assuming they are missing and the disappearing girls aren’t just an urban lesson. Suspects include Melissa’s father and husband, Keisha’s mother, a cop named Doug who helps Liz develop a map of missing girls, and a guy named Chris who encountered Liz in the woods on the night that Keisha disappeared. Not to mention a shadowy dog monster that might be lurking in the woods. Maybe the killer is supernatural. Maybe the killer belongs to a satanic cult performing one of those annual solstice sacrifices that thriller writers love to imagine.

I won’t spoil the ending, but it’s fair to say that the resolution combines a murder mystery with the supernatural. The explanation for the unsolved (perhaps unnoticed) killings is a stretch. So is the motivation that drives the supernatural entity.

Stories of the supernatural merit the suspension of disbelief only if they are frightening; Jackal fails to meet that test. Liz’s important learning moment at the novel’s end is a bit contrived, although I liked the use of a supernatural entity as an allegory for the racial hatred that divides the nation. I’m recommending the novel for the mild suspense it generates, for Erin E. Adams’ effort to build Liz into a fully realized character, and for the important themes that hold the story together.

RECOMMENDED

3.5 rounded down

I loved about the first half of Jackal, then it got a little weird for me especially the ending. But, I think that's just because horror isn't my usual genre so if you like supernatural, weird horror then you will probably enjoy the ending more than I did. It was pretty suspenseful throughout and overall I enjoyed it and would recommend!

Thanks to Random House - Ballantine and NetGalley for the ARC in exchange for my honest review.

This took me so long to read even though it was so short like why? I feel like I just didn’t like this main character and it took me so long to get into the story because of her. I liked the idea of this story a lot though which is why it’s getting four stars but I did not love Liz.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for providing a digital review copy of this book. This does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review.

This book messed me up in the best way. The author captured the eeriness of the Appalachian woods and combined it with the danger and vulnerability of being a Black girl in a predominately white town. This was a quick and intense read and I was definitely on the edge of my seat trying to figure out what was going to happen in the end.

good book and really enjoyed the characters and their journey. I liked the romance.. I enjoyed how the characters grew in the book and what happened.

I really enjoyed this book! I read it in 3 days, which is fast for me! The book was very action packed. I didn’t expect the villain to be who they were, so that was a good surprise. I had a few guesses for it, but I was wrong on all of them. Which doesn’t happen often, so that says a lot about the book!

I had to take a break from reading only because I bit off a bit too much to chew there..... But I thought this was a really good read!! Especially for spooky season!!

<i> Thank you NetGalley for a chance to read an advanced copy of this book <i>

Not every story that opens with a sense of “Once upon a time” has a happy ending. Many Grimm fairy tales are indeed grim and make readers uncomfortable, which is not necessarily a bad thing.

Jackal is set in Johnstown, Pennsylvania, a booming steel town in the 1800s. Seventy miles to the east of Pittsburgh, Johnstown’s best days are in the rearview mirror. The novel feels like a horror story. But—no spoilers—Jackal also reads like a fictionalized and enhanced autobiography. Meet Liz Rocher, who embodies the title of Thomas Wolfe’s You Can’t Go Home Again. The phrase reverberates in her head as she sweats out whether she will get off the train taking her back to Johnstown for her best friend’s wedding. Liz is black, and Mel, her best friend from childhood, is white—like most folks in Johnstown, a fact that is pivotal to Jackal.

Before Liz grew up in Johnstown, Alice, a black girl, was murdered. Her body was found in the woods, her heart ripped out of her body. Alice’s mother Tanisha felt uncomfortable in Johnstown: “Upon arriving, Tanisha didn’t trust the place. If pressed, she couldn’t say why. The best answer she could give was: It felt too safe.” Too safe seems odd but Adams fleshes it out. Tanisha, a city girl, was used to danger that “always lurked right around the corner.” But Johnstown has no corners—danger isn’t hiding, rather “it preferred to fester.”

Tanisha was a loving and cautious mother to Alice. When Alice became a teen, she begged for permission to join her friends in the woods. The shadowy woods worried Tanisha, who felt shadows hid danger. And danger for Black girls was different.

After Alice’s murder, Tanisha’s life stopped. Evans’ epigraph on Alice’s murder is haunting, “With each passing second, the pain of the present robbed the past of its luster.”

Liz Rocher does not want to go home. She never does:

I take another gulp of my train wine. The cheap varietal burns my palate. Varietal. Palate. Who do you think you are? There it is. Judgment. One of the many things I ran from when I left.

Liz has a therapist who tries to reprogram Liz’s worries and self-criticism over being a black woman who never felt welcomed in Appalachia. Through therapy and, inevitably, avoidance, Liz deals with her memories. Not to mention a successful career.

On her journey back to Johnstown for the wedding, Liz contemplates just staying on the train, but then Mel calls and Liz decides not only can’t she skip the wedding but also can’t skip seeing Mel’s daughter Caroline—Liz’s goddaughter, whom she adores.

When Liz disembarks from the train, she is solicited by a disheveled older woman, “nondescript in her Blackness.” Liz isn’t having it. The unhappy woman reminds Liz of how easily folks label her—as a domestic helper or shop clerk—someone unlike her professional self. “Here, the make of my bag, the quality of my clothes, the timbre of my voice, the style of my hair, none of that matters. My skin speaks first, and it is too close to this woman’s for comfort.”

Mel and Garrett are marrying in a barn surrounded by woods. It’s Liz’s least favorite place in Johnstown: She can’t stop thinking about her friend Keisha. The last time she saw her alive was at a bonfire party in the woods. Then Keisha disappeared.

Unbelievably, so does Caroline, in the party after her parents’ nuptials. Liz freaks out: It’s Keisha redux.

Keisha Woodson, the only other Black girl in Liz’s high school, walked into the woods with a mysterious man and was later found with her chest cavity ripped open and her heart removed. Liz shudders at the thought that it could have been her, and now, with Caroline missing, it can’t be a coincidence.

Liz shelves all her discomfort to focus on finding Caroline alive. Nothing else matters. Liz learns Alice wasn’t the first black girl to go missing in the woods. There have been many others. Liz doesn’t run away, convinced Caroline is still alive and that she’s the only one who can save her. Liz is determined to break the horrific pattern that only impacts young black girls, only to discover a supernatural element: It’s watching. It’s taking. It’s your turn.

Someone—a monster—has waited all these years for Liz to return. Taking Caroline is a way to entice Liz into his trap. The supernatural metaphor lays bare the rotten heart of Johnstown’s casual racism.

Jackal is a disturbing, ultimately hopeful story about confronting your past to save the people you love. Using courage and tenacity, Liz Rocher rewrites the script of what it means to be a black girl in Johnstown.

I had mixed feelings while reading JACKAL by Erin E. Adams. Liz Rocher, a young black woman, is returning to her hometown Johnstown, PA (a predominately white small town) for her best friend’s wedding. What was supposed to be just a weekend visit turns into a longer nightmarish stay when the bride’s young daughter goes missing during the wedding. The longer Liz stays to help with the search, the more she uncovers about the town’s dark history of missing black girls.

The premise is excellent and the author really does a great job in showing just how deep racism can run for years. It’s pretty obvious from the reader’s point of view how suspicious it is that every year a black child disappears and then is found brutally slaughtered in the woods. And the fact that the rest of the town makes multiple justifications on each death is unbelievable.

The chapters of each missing girl for the last 20 years or so are particularly well done and they’ll sadden and infuriate you. But the rest of the book just didn’t do it for me and I can’t put my finger on why. I found it dragging in many parts despite my keen interest in finding out answers. And the main character, Liz, was not that likable for me.

It’s so strange when a story interests you but something is just not working out. I did end up finishing it and I’m glad I did. I just wish I liked the writing style better.

I’m actually in shock that this is a debut novel. I knew very early on while reading this that it was going to be a five star. I am blown away with how this book manages to do so much and pack such a huge punch in less than 400 pages.

The double meanings, deep discussions, and thought provoking questions that this book raises need to be experienced by EVERYONE. I feel almost as though this book did what a couple of books I read recently tried to do, but ultimately missed the mark. This book, however, hit the nail on the head!

Liz was probably the smartest female protagonist I’ve read from in a while. At no point was I yelling at her for making dumb and rash decisions and I LOVE THAT! Also, the way this book is told was so unique and interesting (won’t say too much about that for fear of spoilers) but it kept me extremely interested in what was going to happen next!

Do yourself a favor and read this book!

This book was a great mixture of horror and heart. I really enjoyed the way the plot was structured with time jumps back and forth and enjoyed the character development. I would recommend this book to horror fans and non-horror fans alike

The story was well-written and compelling, the characters engrossing. The mystery contained enough possibilities and supernatural ambiguities that I remained uncertain until the final moments. This combination is quite rare for me, so I am delighted and looking forward to whatever Erin E. Adams writes next.