Good story with a little science fiction

This kept my attention right from the start. I listened to the audio of this while working on a project and it was good enough that when I missed a section due to having to concentrate on the project I went back and repeated it. I seldom do that.

It reminded me a little of something Stephen King would write. The prose wasn’t quite as good as a King novel, but the plot was excellent. I loved the ending.

It did make me think about our memories @nd how accurate they really are.

I enjoyed this very much. I may read the e-copy once it is released.

Our memories define our lives. It’s through memories that we see ourselves and understand the world. What would happen if we had a chance to replay our true memories to see what actually happened at any given situation? What if the memories we watched were different than the memories we told ourselves? This is precisely what happens to Sean. Through his employment, he is given an opportunity to go back in time and record his memories. Sean’s first wife was murdered and although he was there when it happened, he can’t remember anything. The murderer was never found. Sean is eager to try out the memory box with hopes of drawing out his memories from that fateful evening.

This sci fi thriller had a ton of promise! This incredibly intriguing premise drew me in immediately. The mind blowing concept of having your life rewritten by watching old memories was one I was eager to read about. There were moments of brilliance but I wish they had been carved out more. More depth in characters and the sci fi plot were needed. . I thought the beginning was well executed. However, as the plot progressed, it became less engaging to the point of ridiculous by the end. There was also something missing that resulted in a detached reading experience. I wanted to love this book but found it mediocre.

The audiobook narration was average.

I received an advanced audio copy from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

An interesting concept. The protagonist Sean Whittlesea is competing to join his bosses bizarre group - The Widowers Club, those who are successful rise to fame and fortune.

 When he finally passes the first test he is gifted a black box of his memories; The Memory Palace which he can plug into and watch as often as he wants. He uses this to try and solve his wife’s murder, but the more he watches, the more he realises his own memories are not all accurate and he begins to question everything.



The idea is thought provoking, how fallible are all of our memories? and aren’t they what makes us … us.



A good concept but it didn’t necessarily grip me, I’m not sure why, a great twist at the end though.

Cover: ⭐⭐⭐
Writing: ⭐⭐⭐⭐
Character Building: ⭐⭐⭐⭐
Ending: ⭐⭐⭐
Overall Rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐

Thank you Netgalley and Imbrifex Audio For the opportunity to listen to this audiobook arc.

Sean Whittlesea was there when his wife was murdered. He saw the light leave her eyes. He held her dead body in his arms.He knows he wept, but he cannot recollect a single other detail. Tormented by the tragedy, Sean relives the horror over and over again. As he struggles to recall what really happened, his imagination serves up an endless chain of scenarios. The truth, however, remains hidden in the vault of his memory, and the key is nowhere to be found.

The narration was really good, it captured my attention and the voices was really good.

You are taken on a journey with Sean as he watches his memories using the black box device. I got serious Stephen King vibes around the idea of this book. I loved how he tried to help Nick through his grief showing him memories of his mom and how Nick showed courage in standing up for the right thing.

A very enjoyable book that will show you to cherish you memories and those around you.

Thanks to NetGalley for the audiobook ARC!

Scarecrow Has a Gun is an interesting novel that explores the idea that our memories, even collective memories, are very fallible. The plot centers around a group of widowers who regularly vie for special attention and projects from their billionaire boss. But at what cost? An interesting premise, and well-written. I especially enjoyed the ending.

After the first couple of chapters, I was thinking it was going to be a mix of Squid Games (TV show) and Recursion (book by Blake Crouch), and was really excited to see where it would go. But, nope, it was all downhill from there. It had a lot of potential but fell flat. The writing was ok but the characters superficial and story just odd.

Thanks to NetGalley.

Thanks to NetGalley for the arc in return for an honest review.
The plot was interesting I just couldn't quite get into it. I don't think this writing style was for me.

The story line was captivating but I didn't enjoy all the flash backs and didn't think they were all relevant to the storyline. Definitely a depressing read in many ways. Not as captivating from the start as it could have been.
The audiobook was also just difficult to listen to on this forum. I did really enjoy the narrator though!

What a wild, weird read. This sucked me in right away but I ended up feeling like I was missing a lot of answers by the time I was done. I'd definitely read more by this author, but this one didn't fully connect for me.

"Only in hell are the memories real."

OH.MY.GOD.
This book actually triggered my thinking process and made me rethink of all the things i thought i knew very accurately. This is a true masterpiece. i loved this one so much. Scarecrow Has A Gun is packed with intrigue and philosophical exploration, diving into the differences between truth and memory. It poses questions like ‘how much does the past shape us?’ Or ‘what if you discovered your past wasn’t what you thought?’ And the answers come in the form of a little black box.

About half book into, i was not able to relate the tittle of the book to the plot, and then it hit me, and it hit so hard that i almost skipped a heart beat. For someone like me, who reads thrillers all the time, it is easy for me to predict the climax. But this one, oh my god, totally unpredictable and i did not see that coming at all.

The prose is clean and easy to read. It’s introspective, delving into the minutiae of life. Descriptions linger in the details, but deliberately so, as this feeds into the book’s questions. It succeeds in making you feel like you’re living through things along with Sean, and actually adds a layer of depth here that would be missing otherwise.

I am very thankful to the author, the publisher and netgallery for the advanced copy. This one is a highly recommend by me. i would definitely like to read future books. Thankyou.

Thank you to Netgalley for an advanced copy of this book.

I loved this book from the beginning. Sean wins a game hosted by his boss. He wins a black box that allows him to see all of his memories. Would you? This is where the book takes a really awesome turn. It bounces between Sean’s memories and the present-day. I love the psychological perspective of the inaccuracies of our memories.

I was thrown for a loop by the ending in a good way. This was well presented in audio format and I can see enjoying this in print or audio.

Thanks # netgallery for this book in exchange for an honest review. This book has stayed with me well after I finished. The concept of this book was new and refreshing. I highly recommend.

Thank you to NetGalley for the audiobook for review!

This book caught my eye because of the synopsis that made it sound like a mystery/sci-fi built on the fallibility of memory and the Manela Effect that we all experience. What I ended up getting was all of that and then some.

Scarecrow Has a Gun felt reminiscent of a Blake Crouch novel. With the personal, in the head of our protagonist writing style and an ominous, mysterious vibe that flowed through it all. This is a good thing since I really enjoy the books of Blake Crouch , such as Dark Matter and the Wayward Pines trilogy. The sci-fi elements are muted, limited mostly to the somewhat futuristic technology provided by the ominous Mr. Ulger. This story really is more of a mystery/thriller that uses memory and grief as its key drivers. The pacing is pretty quick which aids with keeping the reader engaged throughout.

I was not a huge fan of the various characters that we are presented with. Most are pretty unlikeable overall, but I think this was largely by design. It helped add to the dark feel of the story but unfortunately, it made them hard to cheer for. The narration was solid if unspectacular. It got the job done and the narrator coneyed the tone of the book well by how he read it.

Overall, I give it 4 stars. I really wanted to get back to it each time I stopped listening and that'a sign of a good read in my book.

Scarecrow Has a Gun
Michael Paul Kozlowsky
Sean Whittlesea is tormented by his wife’s murder. He held her in his arms as she took her last breath but that’s all he can remember. He struggles to remember the details to no avail. Sean has since remarried and is the father of a son and daughter. His boss is a rather strange man; always holding even stranger contests. Sean wins a black box called a Memory Palace; the box allows the possessor to experience memories on a screen. At first Sean believes the box is the answer to his search for memories of his wife’s death but instead the box brings turmoil to his family. He wants to spend all his time with the box; its like an addiction.
I wanted to like this book, but I struggled to finish it. The book is well written, so it is not the author’s fault that I did not care for the characters. Starting with the boss, I cannot figure out why the men of the “Widower’s Club” listened to him. Then there was Holly, the second wife; what a witch. Sean isn’t even likable, and neither is his son. The most likable person was the weird woman that was at the school picking up her nephew.
This book is referred to as science fiction and I suppose it is to some extent but I saw it more as a mystery.

3.5⭐️
Scarecrow Has a Gun was off the chain! I stop and had to look this author up in hopes of discovering more about how he writes. I had only children books that held no answers.
So how do I begin…… At first I was wondering why it started the way it did and tried to track this support group. And then it was was was I guess some intense insight to a person view. It touched on many things and I couldn’t figure out where it was going.
I want to point out by this time I was settled in and was interested. It’s a look at behavior and memory in a nut shell and we’re strapped in a roller coaster that flings you up side down.
If you’re patient it will all makes sense. Somewhat….. It’s a crazy story. I chose to listen to this book on audio and David Doersch narrated it. He did a suitable job.
Thanks Embrifex Audio via NetGalley.

I’ll be posting on FB, Instagram, Goodreads and Amazon

Scarecrow Has a Gun is a novel about Sean Whittlesea, a man who is part of a widow's club at work because of the loss of his wife. This inner circle gets a benefit from the boss, in the form of a contest that is held at regular intervals. When Sean finally gets his reward, will it be all that he dreamed of or will it destroy his life?

The idea behind this book is more interesting than the novel itself. Are the memories stored in our consciousness real or have they been manipulated? Sean drives himself crazy trying to figure out if the memories are real, with a narration that increasingly becomes the rantings of a paranoid man. David Doersch does a good job of portraying Sean, giving voice to a man who ends up not trusting anyone or anything.

Too much of the story was cribbed from other recognizable forms. I could see where the author was heading and was disappointed as a result. I liked the idea of the novel, but was less interested in where the book ultimately ended up. The audio version of the book was well done and the only reason why I finished the novel. For these reasons, I would be hesitant to recommend Scarecrow Has a Gun to other readers.

Disclaimer: I was given an Advanced Audio Copy by NetGalley and the publisher, Imbrifex Audio. The decision to read and review this novel was entirely my own.

"To remember is a creative act."

Our memories are deeply flawed, Our memories are flawed both individually and communally. We share so many false memories that the phenomenon has come to be referred to colloquially as the Mandela Effect - based on a shared false belief shared by millions that the South African President died in prison in the 1980s. A great many of us remember great movie lines like: "Luke, I am your father;" "Play it again, Sam;" "Life is like a box of chocolates;" "Mirror, mirror on the wall;" and "Hello, Clarice" that which were simply never uttered in the films we recall them from.

In this intriguing and well-narrated tale, we meet a man who is offered the gift, or curse, of real memory, true memory, actual memory. Life as it was lived, not as remembered. Something our protagonist desires, having lost his recall surrounding the events of the death of his first wife to foul play. Could this be the key to unlocking the mystery of her death? Could this be the answer to his disconnect with his son. Could this doom his relationship with his current wife and daughter?

The answers to these questions make for an intriguing mystery with some slightly horrifying undertones, but what made this a book I couldn't stop listening to was the concept of memory and how it shades our lives. How every new experience after our infancy is shaded by our memories, memories which are inherently flawed. I was left wondering if my life was better or worse than I remember. Or was it just different? Is it more or less impactful that the queen in Snow White talks to the magic mirror on the wall?

I hate spoilers, I hate reviews with spoilers, and it's difficult to say more about the story without getting into them, so I'll address other aspects of the book. The writing is brisk and easy to follow. Nothing here that needn't be and, yet, nothing missing -- a rare feat, in my opinion. The characters were real. The protagonist was likeable. His motivations clear, understandable, relatable. He was clever, but not overmuch. The villain was vile, but not so vile as not to be believable. The tech seemed plausible with only a slight suspension of disbelief. The audio was reasonably well-produced with only minor fluctuations in volume. The narration was excellent. The narrator served the role of the protagonist rather than versatile voice actor giving life to each character, which was appropriate to the story.

The story gets a 5/5, the writing gets a 5/5, and the narration gets a 5/5. I loved every minute of it.

** spoiler alert ** Audio - arc provided by NetGalley and Edelweiss



If this wasn't an arc I would have DNFed this book, I didn't find it particularly thrilling and it felt disjointed. The ending was so abrupt and unbelievable it was funny, I don't think that just because the protagonist came home without the box and seemed different he could be forgiven for all of the trauma he inflicted on his family

Thanks to NetGalley and Imbrifex Books for sending me an ARC Audiobook of Scarecrow Has a Gun in exchange for an honest review.

The plot of Scarecrow Has a Gun is very straightforward. Sean Whittlesea is a widower whose wife was murdered so brutally that he has never been able to remember the details or help the police find the killer. Many years later, he’s remarried and has a family, but he is still haunted by the event. One day, Sean’s boss Mr. Ulger gives Sean a box he calls a Memory Palace, a futuristic device that shows can show a person all of their memories fully intact to the last detail. But the box shows seemingly random memories, not the ones Sean wants to watch, and some of the memories shown are not how Sean remembers them happening, leaving Sean asking some deep questions about who he really is.

There were elements of Scarecrow Has a Gun that I quite liked. Sean’s boss Mr. Ulger, and his Widowers Club, were appropriately mysterious and unsettling. I’m always here for some good Mandela Effect/false memory conversations. Why does no one remember that there’s a brief scene in The Wizard of Oz where the Scarecrow holds a revolver? Is it just because it’s so illogical that people blocked it out? I mean, that movie scared me so much when I was young that I still refuse to watch it, but what’s everyone else’s excuse for forgetting? Best of all, the discussions about the malleability of memory were interesting and sometimes creepy. People do often choose which moments to focus on, and thus which stick in our memories and which are lost. We choose which moments to change our behavior based upon and which to ignore. And we even subtly shape our memories over time, minimizing some parts (often when we are the villain) and exaggerating others (often when we are either the hero or the victim), all to the effect of building our own narrative of who we think we are.

That said, Scarecrow Has a Gun has some flaws. The middle portion is a bit repetitive as Sean watches many memories without really moving the story forward. More critically, having one piece of future tech in an otherwise set-in-the-present novel makes for an interesting what-if story or way to view our current world. Having more than one makes it much harder for the reader to suspend their disbelief. Worse, these other pieces of future tech—that come in a late reveal—are vital to the plot’s resolution.

Finally, a word about the narrator, David Doersch, who I thought did a very good job. There’s a darkness—a noir element—to Scarecrow Has a Gun, and his voice really captured it. I especially enjoyed his portrayal of Mr. Ulger, and his hideous cackling laugh for Josie may have hurt my brain, but it was perfect for the way she’s written.

At its core, Scarecrow Has a Gun is really just a mash-up of two other stories (one of which is actually referenced in the novel when it takes that turn) that I can’t name without spoiling the story. And the concepts and ideas discussed along the way were probably a bit more memorable (pun intended) than the actual plot. Still, I enjoyed the ride. 3.5 stars rounded up to 4.

Thank you NetGalley for a free copy in exchange for an honest review. This is about a man who wins a competition from the widower club. His prize is a box that shows him an accurate presentation of what actually happened to him instead of what he thinks happened in his memories.
I didn't care for this book, and I don't know why but the recording gave me a head ache when I'd listen to it.