For me, this is about as middle of the road as they come. The story was fine. The flashback/backstory was slightly better. The characters were neither insipid nor super well-developed. So. That happened.

Right off the bat, I don't think marketing "to a generation of murderinos" (a term at the very least popularized by My Favorite Murder) is cool when there's literally a line bashing a made up podcast that makes jokes and gets stuff wrong about crime details. I mean, sure, I'm sure that's not everyone's cup of tea when it comes to a crime podcast, but it's a *podcast*, it's not your criminal justice professor giving a lecture. It just feels a little misleading for me to have read this based on that pitch. But, anyway, that was just one line of this story.

This story starts with Natalie finding out her favorite teacher was murdered. Natalie already has a true crime podcast, but she wants to investigate her teacher's murder herself so that she doesn't get "forgotten." It's pretty brutal, though; this girl starts recording as soon as she gets to her teacher's memorial service.

The thing about her podcast is that I am never shown anything about her podcast prior to, or almost even during, the story. It's not like A Good Girl's Guide to Murder... there's no recording sessions other than Natalie sometimes remembering to record people's statements on her phone. It made me not care that she had a podcast, because I was really only told and not shown.

Natalie meets a boy named Kurt and they have a really weird relationship. He is sweet, but a little pushy, and Natalie even talks about how she feels like he stole their first kiss from her and feeling uncomfortable about it. I DID NOT LIKE THIS PART. Especially because she sees him the next day and decides that she does think it's okay that she likes him and never mentions the questionable consent kiss ever again. Even if this is a realistic situation that teens find themselves in, there needs to be something in the book challenging it, in my opinion. Teens aren't stupid and they don't need things spelled out for them, but with issues of consent I think it's important to cement the idea in their heads that consent isn't only important but necessary.

Natalie's mom is WILDLY protective. It is so annoying, lol. What's even more annoying is that her mom forgets to be protective when it's convenient for the story. You find out via flashbacks that her mom is like that because she also dealt with someone she knew becoming a victim of a crime. The flashback portions are fine and all, but it's just kind of there. It's hard to attach the version of Natalie's mom that you know to the college freshman in the flashbacks. What's REALLY weird is that we are all so old now that YA protagonist's MOMS have cell phones in flashbacks and the timelines check out for that. But, I digress.

The actual mystery ending is alright. All the loose ends tied up pretty well. I still had a little tear in my eye on the last page. But overall this just was another "true crime podcast" YA book and not the best one I've ever read, either.

Natalie Temple is a true crime junkie. She even has a podcast; who cares if only three people listen to it. She just graduated high school and is spending the summer working on her mom’s diner before she goes off to journalism school. It’s at the diner that she first hears that her favorite teacher was murdered. Now Natalie has a true crime story that hits close to home, and she’s going to be the one to get to the bottom of it. Is she too close to the case though? Will her love for her teacher get her too close to the killer?
Ehrlich created an intricate story line with twists and turns that any mystery reader will love. However, the character development was a bit lacking. It was hard to care about the story when I didn’t care about the characters. Natalie was the only fully developed character, and she was a bit annoying. Her journalistic tactics were extremely unethical, and when another reporter made similar decisions, Natalie hypocritically judged them. The storytelling across multiple timelines was intriguing though. Every few chapters went back in time to when Natalie’s mother was in college, but even with the flashbacks, her motivations were unclear as well. Ultimately the story was good, but I felt that the execution was lacking.