Sadie Keller wants answers. Her brother was found on the floor, dead. Powers that be have stated that the man died from a drug overdose ... the leading cause of death in this small town in Kansas. The man's wife began selling or destroying his things almost immediately after his death. She's refused to allow an autopsy. She refuses to release his medical records to his sisters and mother.

She wants the police to look into her brother's death, but they, too, have their hands full. A divorced man took his young daughter and never returned her to her mother. A skull is found in the woods and it's the worst news any parent can hear. The father is found at a later date, also in the woods... both have been shot. Murder? Murder Suicide?

Are these crimes connected? The more Sadie investigates, the more she learns about small town secrets and lies. She also finds that someone wants her silenced .... maybe permanently.

This was a new author to me so I wasn't sure what to expect. I found a well-written mystery filled with suspense, twists and turns that led to a surprising ending. There are many, many characters, all intertwined with each other, which left me puzzled for a short while. The story premise is a good one ... and I liked how the author tackled today's problem of the use of opioids, especially in the young.

Many thanks to the author / Random House - Spiegel & Grau / Netgalley for the digital copy of this crime fiction. Read and reviewed voluntarily, opinions expressed here are unbiased and entirely my own.

Read 25%, and could not get into it. It was fine, however was unlikely to be any higher than a generous (on my part) 3-star read. None of the characters, nor the plot drew me in, and unfortunately I found myself avoiding reading because I wasn’t feeling this one. Am throwing in the towel, and moving on.

The mystery at the center of this book was compelling to me and I enjoyed the characters. I kept reading and wanted to find out what happened but there was a lot of exposition in the book. This comes down to personal preference for sure! Each reader is different so I found myself skipping over some long paragraphs but the story was well done!

Dark & atmospheric, a gritty page turner - everything I loved about Laura McHugh's previous novel, The Weight of Blood. A great ready for a hot summer afternoon - I recommend this novel for an entertaining and engaging summer read.

The Wolf Wants In by Laura McHugh is a compelling and consuming story of what happens in a midwestern small-town in the middle of an opioid crisis. The story is told from the perspectives of two women, Sadie wants to find out what really caused her brother's death and Henley wants to break free of the addiction in her family and start over. The characters McHugh creates in this story come alive - they could be your next door neighbors.

I received an ARC from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

This is a very strong work of fiction. I thought it was going to be a lot darker and I’m so glad it wasn’t! Don't get me wrong, this still deals with some very heavy topics (the opioid crisis, a small town community being left behind, etc.), but thanks to the previous book I read, I was in the right headspace for this.

I'm glad to have read this for a couple of reasons: 1) I try and make an effort to read books that will provide an alternative view to what I have experienced 2) I had never heard of this author before 3) After I was granted my "wish" on Netgalley, I wasn't looking forward to reading it because I thought maybe it would be a little too dark for my tastes, but I'm so glad I took a chance because I would have missed out on a great book.

The story is told from two different perspectives, Sadie Keller in the present and Henley Pettit a few months in the past. Both timelines eventually meet and I thought this was a great plot device to help elevate the story. Sadie's brother, Shane, has just died and the family is trying to pull answers from his wife, Crystle, whom they don't have the easiest relationship with. Her reaction to Shane's death is odd (at best) and it's causing the family to have difficulty putting this behind them. In Henley's portion of the book, you aren't quite sure what the relation is to Shane and his family, but as the book progresses, it becomes clear that there is a reason we are reading from Henley's perspective.

As I said, I really liked this book and I was pulled in immediately and the grip it had over me never let go. It made me so thankful for my place in life because I could have easily been born into a community like this where certain events outside of your control put everyone a couple of steps behind. I loved these characters (particularly, Sadie and her sister Becca) and I thought the story's resolution was a little rushed in places, but overall very strong and believeable.

I really want to thank Netgalley for granting my wish, Spiegel & Grau and Laura McHugh for providing me an advance copy to read and provide an honest review. I know for sure I will absolutely check out her next work as this was such a stellar effort.

Review Date: 8/8/19
Publication Date: 8/6/19

This story of life and death in a small Kansas town has many of the hallmarks of life all over the country in recent years especially in the influence of drugs and crime, but its atmosphere is specific to its place, people and geography. I’ve read McHugh before and she brings out the heart and soul, the good and bad of her characters as well as the tempered beauty and and growing poverty of this area left behind in our “new” economy.

In Blackwater Kansas, two women, one a young mother, the other just out of high school, are caught up in problems of their own families. Sadie Keller is trying to discover how her older brother died during the summer when she didn’t even know he was ill. And why would his wife behave so strangely? Living in a trailer with her mother, when her mother stays clean, Henley Pettit simply wants out. She wants to have a different life away from the remains of family she has but can’t depend on. The novel is told from the alternating perspectives of Sadie and Henley which provides introductions to most people in this town. And the stories of Sadie and Henley will dance around each other in this small place until you can’t help but wonder if there will be a collision.

This is a well written novel with suspense, well developed characters and a plot and setting taken from today’s news.

A copy of this book was provided by the publisher through NetGalley in return for an honest review.

An impressive and engrossing novel about so many tragedies- but with a glimmer of hope. Sadie's brother Shane has died and she and her sister Becca don't understand what happened. His wife Crystal (hateful woman) claims she came home and found him dead on the floor but this just doesn't make sense. At the same time, Sadie's friend Hannah's daughter and ex-husband are first missing and then found dead. Alternating Sadie's story is that of Henley, the daughter of an addict who just wants to leave town but finds herself in a rats nest with Jason, son of the local wealthy man. These two tales come together. It's very rural noir, with drugs running under all of it and the deep class divisions that can exist in a small town. Henley's a Petit and they're, well, they aren't known for doing good things. Sadie's kept Shane's dog Gravy (love Gravy) and made sure that Shane's Firebird will go to his much doted on young friend Charlie (who is also Henley's good friend). The mystery of what happened to Shane, as well as to Macey, and Roger, spools out slowly but is so carefully plotted with good twists that I wasn't sure where it was going. Sadie and Becca's conviction that Shane was. good man underlies all of it and is proven true. There's a nice twist at the end. Thanks to Netgalley for the ARC. Highly recommend for a good, if serious, read.

{My Thoughts}
The Wolf Wants In is a gritty story of a town touched by tragedy at every turn. Drugs and the crimes that come with them have devastated many, but that’s only the start of problems for Blackwater, Kansas. Adding to its grief are a child that’s vanished, leaving her single-mother with only a fragile thread of hope to hang onto. A man has died way too young and his sisters struggle to accept that “natural causes” could be the answer. And a young woman fresh out of high school longs to escape, even as she’s left alone while her mother once again relapses into the dark underworld of opioids.

“The fallout from the drug epidemic had introduced new problems and compounded existing ones. Older people who would normally turn to their families for help now had children or grandchildren stealing their money and pills, and when those kids overdosed or went to rehab or prison, they left behind babies the grandparents were ill-equipped to raise.”

Chapters in The Wolf Wants In alternated between Sadie, on the hunt to find answers for how her healthy 36-year old brother could have suddenly died, and Henley, niece of the county’s biggest drug dealers and daughter to one of its biggest addicts. The two families might seem to have little in common, yet both shared a deep love of their own and a tenuous connection in the marriage of Sadie’s brother, Shane, to Henley’s cousin, Crystle. This back and forth both created the mysteries surrounding Blackwater and helped to resolve them. Henley’s timeline started four months prior to Sadie’s and as the two moved closer and closer together the picture grew clear.

Overall, I really enjoyed The Wolf Wants In, but did feel like it had a couple of flaws. The first was in a side character, Jason, who was just a little too off for me to believe. The second came in the story’s resolution which I found too wobbly and in need of a little more nuance to bring this reader fully onboard. Still, I loved the first 80% of McHugh’s story and the sense of bleakness she created among the people of Blackwater. It was a place I’d never want to live, but one I also couldn’t look away from. For those reasons I look forward to reading more from McHugh.

Note: I received a copy of this book from Spiegel & Grau (via NetGalley) in exchange for my honest review.

We are alongside the narrators, Sadie who is investigating her brother’s death and Henley who just wants to escape the small rural Kansas town hit hard by the opioid crisis, in the Wolf Wants In.

Shane, Sadie’s brother, dies from a heart attack under mysterious circumstances. No autopsy is done possibly because Shane’s wife Crystle can barely afford to keep her body and soul together. The local police are preoccupied with a child’s skull found nearby.

Henley has no dad and an occasionally drugged-out mom. She is also dating the town’s rich boy, Jason Sullivan, as well as being Crystle’s cousin. She knows what her life holds if she stays in Blackwater so she plans to leave.

The Wolf Wants In is a great character study of a town victimized by opioids, the residents’ own bad behavior, and the two women mired in it. It is a slow quiet burn of a read—not really a thriller. However, I still liked it until the too quickly tied-in-a-bow conclusion. However, if you like literary fiction, you will enjoy the complexity of the characters and the excellent prose of this tale. 4 stars!

Thanks to Spiegel & Grau and NetGalley for a wished for copy in exchange for my honest review.

Told by two women, Sadie a middle-aged single mom with a young daughter (who spends half of her time with her father) and Henley a 18-year-old young woman who's drug addicted mother moves in and out of her life depending on where she is on her rehab journey. Told in alternating chapters,, I had a hard time following, however, about midway through as their timelines came closer together it was easier to follow the path.

While the story came somewhat together in the end and most questions were answered, I found the story lacking in character development in particular with Charlie, who seemed to be heavily involved with Henley but we hardly got to see him. He was a much more likable character than Jason. There were lot of people on the outer edges that had roles that were very vague but were key in the end. It was never fully clear to me what happened to make murdering people the only solution to the problem.

I did enjoy the family interactions with the Keller family and could relate to the parallel lives of the siblings - living near one another but not always having meaningful contact. I think if you were from the mid-west you might find the story more relatable.

Small town life in America these days seems to be about dying downtown squares, growing poverty, and the opioid epidemic, all lightly dusted with a golden nostalgia for the glory that once was. Laura McHugh has expertly captured this in her latest novel.

McHugh’s book follows two women from the same small Kansas town. Sadie is grieving the sudden loss of her brother and decides she needs to look into it and determine if it was more than it seems. Henley is 18 and on the verge of escape from the small town that will hold her down should she choose to stay. Sadie and Henley’s stories weave together to shine a light on the dark underbelly of the town and surprising truths are revealed that change their lives and what they thought they knew about their small town.

I’ve enjoyed McHugh’s previous books, and I found this one to be quite good. It’s probably (in my opinion) her best writing so far. The story flows along without any hitches; I genuinely felt pulled in and was satisfied with the ending (though don’t expect anything really “feel good” about it). I’d recommend this to readers who want something suspenseful, but also something that reflects reality and the terrors that exist within it.
Thanks to Netgalley and Random House for providing the review copy.

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
I have to say the marketing for this book was spot on.- Sharp Objects meets S-Town

A small Kansas town deep into the opioid crisis is the setting for this story. It is not uplifting or hopeful. The tone of the book is more about the small country roads, trailers and modest homes that haven’t seen renovations, families touched by alcohol and drugs and sometimes crime. The place has had its fill of tragedies in the past.

Told in dual POVs this story explores an Amber Alert issued for a small girl and her father who were meant to have returned from a fishing trip. The ex-wife is broken and wonders if her ex-husband could be capable of hurting their daughter. The chapters alternate between Sadie, who is friends with the grieving mother and who is also herself grieving for the sudden death of her brother, and Henley, who is a teen with an unreliable mother in and out of jail and rehab, whose uncles watch out for her.

This book is very atmospheric and fast paced. Many details are packed into a book that is a little over 250 pages. It also has several characters, many of which are related in some way. This book could have used a family tree diagram. I took notes which was very helpful.

Thank you to @netgalley and @randomhouse for this ARC in exchange for an honest review.


[posted to Instagram, Facebook and Twitter for buzz and review. Will post again on release date]

McHugh’s The Wolf Wants In explores complex themes of poverty, opioid addiction, crime, and broken families. The category of “thriller” is somewhat limiting in scope, as the mystery anchors the book, but the thematic topics are not escapist. It’s a dark book, but a rich and captivating read.

Many thanks to NetGalley, the author, and the publisher for providing me with a copy of this book. All thoughts are my own.

A heavy read about rural America, THE WOLF WANTS IN is a sad story about families, addiction, and secrets. It's not a thriller, but it is a dark story that certainly won't cheer you up if you're looking for that in your next read. The characters are rich (though I did find it hard to keep track of everyone at times) and the mystery of the story keeps the pages turning. However, I just didn't connect with the book in the way I thought I would at the start.

Could not read this atmospheric thriller set in Missouri fast enough. Told in two timelines -- one for Sadie and one for Henley -- mysteries abound in the town of Blackwater. Sadie's brother is dead and his wife's family seems eager to sweep the details surrounding that death under the rug. Henley's is a member of the Pettit clan and related to the wife of Sadie's brother. There is also the case of a missing preteen that is troubling the town. The timing of the two narratives allows us to learn more about what happened before and after the pivotal event. Both women are working to keep out their own personal "wolf," but he is a wily one. My favorite Laura McHugh so far! Thrilled to see a local author doing so well.

A shout out to Random House and NetGalley for providing a digital ARC in exchange for an honest review.

This story is told in alternating chapters by two different women. Sadie Keller wants the truth of how her 36-year old brother Shane died but she can't convince the police his death is worth investigating. Sudden deaths are all too common in rural Blackwater, Kansas where the opioid crisis and overdoses are on the rise. The police are also focused on the discovery of a child's skull in the woods. Does it belong to missing Macey Calhoun? Sadie knows Macey's mother Hannah needs closure.

Henley Pettit is an 18-year old who is desperate to escape her life in Blackwater but leaving her drug-addicted mother Missy and her troubled, extended family is more difficult than she imagined.

Both Sadie and Henley have to face the challenges of family loyalties and the secrets they carry and their lives end up intersecting in ways that they had not envisioned.

I received an eARC via Netgalley and Random House Publishing with no requirements for a review. I voluntarily read this book and provided this review.

I enjoyed the book, but it wasn't my favorite. I absolutely loved "The Weight of Blood " and "Arrowood," but this book just didn't grab my attention like the previous ones. Usually I don't mind books that alternate between characters, but I kept getting confused. I had to keep reminding myself that Sadie's story takes place months after Henley's point of view. The story didn't feel like a mystery or thriller. My favorite parts were the interactions between Sadie and her sister Becca. Their conversations would make me laugh. The ending felt rushed. Everyone confesses and it's over. It felt like a let down when the truth was finally revealed. All the loose ends get wrapped up and it's over. I enjoyed reading about Sadie more than Henley. Pretty much Henley's whole family were a bunch of losers and a very rough crowd. I kept wondering how most of them weren't currently in jail. I was surprised how normal Henley turned out, especially with her mom. At least Gravy ended up in a loving home.

I received a complimentary copy of this book from Random House Publishing Group - Random House through NetGalley. Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own.

I really loved her first book really loved her first book, The Weight of Blood, and have been picking up anything she writes ever since. This story is told from the alternating points of view of two women, who do not even know each other, as one tries to uncover how her brother really died. Set in rural Kansas, amid the opioid epidemic, this was an atmospheric, interesting mystery, and It kept me hooked until the end.

I'm not usually a fan of stories told from multiple points of view, but i found both women to be compelling characters. I think the age difference of the two characters, and the perspectives they were coming from helped make it interesting. The atmosphere! i've never been to rural Kansas, but i definitely felt like i had after finishing this book.

4.5 stars, rounded. Laura McHugh's writing is consistently word-perfect. This is a strong literary mystery, with two storylines that seem unrelated at first. Sadie is trying to find answers in the wake of her brother's abrupt death, and Henley is a teenager desperate to escape her small town and small circumstances. Laura McHugh has created a fantastic sense of atmosphere in this story- the stillness of a small town, the simmering of family tensions, the crackling spiderweb connecting people throughout the community in their tragedies. It's evenly paced throughout and was absolutely captivating.