Great read! Looking forward to reading more by this author! Highly recommend!

5 stars

This story is told from the points of view of three people: Bernard an elderly man, Maddie a teenager, and Amy.

An elderly woman named Adel Minor is beaten to death in her own home. The smoking remains of her supper alerted the neighborhood and the fire department to that fact that something was wrong.

Bernard White is an octogenarian widower who still talks to his wife. He mostly stays home except for Wednesdays when he ventures out to the dry cleaners and to go grocery shopping. When he runs into an old friend, he begins to reconnect with his old friends. The murder of Adel is the talk of the town of Seven Springs.

Maddie Lowe is a teenager and a waitress. Her mother has left the family and it has fallen upon Maddie to try to keep her family together. She misses her mother and wonders where she is and what she is doing. Maddie has a guilty secret. When interviewed by the police about Adel’s murder, she doesn’t tell them everything in order to protect her friend Charlie.

Amy Unger is an artist who has survived cancer. But she is not well emotionally. The murder of Adel has thrown her into a crisis. She finally takes up drawing again. She is in a frenzy as she reimagines Adel’s last day. She decides to clean up her abandoned studio and go to buy canvas and paints.

Angela Greene is the next elderly woman murdered in her home. The police begin their second investigation without making any headway in Adel’s murder. While talking over the situation with his friend Danny, Bernard suggests that they contact all of the “originals” as they call themselves. These were the original settlers of the small community. Not to start a vigilante group necessarily, just to talk things over. The Originals conceive an idea that those who want to should pair up so that they won’t be alone. They must ensure that their doors and windows are locked and not open the door to strangers.

When the police arrest a homeless man – the Charlie Amy was trying to protect – the little community is thrown into confusion. Charlie couldn’t be the killer. He was kind and harmless. What were the police doing? When another woman is killed, with Charlie still in jail, it is now clear that he didn’t do the murders. Charlie is released the next morning. Who is doing the killings?

Amy begins to draw and paint Adel’s attack and death. She becomes obsessed with it. Her paintings are the best she’s ever done. Maddie has a relationship. Bernard begins to become very attached to the woman he is staying with for her protection.

This novel is about loss, mistakes, hopelessness, memories both good and bad and hope. The three people who are the main characters are not really all that different. One elderly, one teenager and one middle-aged, but they are all tied together not just by the murders, but also by their seemingly different lifestyles.

The identity of the killer comes as somewhat of a surprise, but why they did it makes sense – sort of.

The book is very well written and plotted. The tension in the story increases and decreases as different things occur, but it is a gentle tension. The reader wonders who could be doing the killings and why. Ms. Owens creates an atmosphere of a small community rocked by the murders, yet as they strive to survive, they are disconnected. They finally gather together to protect and communicate with one another. It’s a beautiful story. The reader is there feeling what the individual narrators are feeling at that time. Very well done, Ms. Owens! I immediately went to Amazon to look for other books of hers.

I want to that NetGalley and Touchstone for forwarding to me a copy of this most remarkable book to read and enjoy.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for a free digital ARC of this book. This book is true to its title description. The reader won't be disappointed when reading this book.

This book had a certain appeal. Someone is killing the elderly residents of an older south Florida neighborhood--a neighborhood that seems to have more than the average number of secrets. The author takes pains to introduce us to the main characters, shifting points of view and writing in a compassionate, compelling style. The ending was pleasantly unexpected, if perhaps a bit pat.