Lenny Marks Gets Away with Murder is a novel that combines humor and heartbreak to tell the story of Lenny Marks, a socially awkward school teacher whose repressed childhood memories resurface when she is confronted with her past. The book delves into Lenny's internal thoughts and her struggles to cope with the traumatic events of her youth. One of the strongest aspects of the book is the portrayal of Lenny's internal world. The author skillfully captures Lenny's thoughts and emotions, allowing readers to empathize with her and understand the complexities of her character. Lenny's journey of self-discovery and healing is both relatable and poignant, making her a compelling protagonist. It is worth noting that the pacing of the story is slow-moving at times and it did take me quite a while to get invested in the story. While the title may suggest a thrilling whodunit, the book offers a different experience that may not align with initial expectations.

It did give me Eleanor Oliphant vibes and I think that may be the best way to describe it. I think it was well written and the writer has promise. Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for an advanced copy of this book in exchange for my honest review.

I went into this fairly blind and enjoyed it way more than I was expecting! 4.5 stars.

It definitely gives strong Eleanor Oliphant vibes in a lot of ways except that you know there’s a mystery in her background. It takes awhile to get to the explanation if that mystery but in the meantime, I enjoyed seeing Lenny start to form relationships and step a bit out of her comfort zone. The portions about her childhood trauma were a little difficult to read. I don’t usually get emotional while reading but there were a few parts where the love demonstrated towards Lenny made me a little teary.

I’m not crazy about the resolution of the book although I think a lot of readers will find it satisfying. This is definitely one I would highly recommend!

This book was enjoyable. It was cozy and fun. But at the same time, there were dark moments in it. Lenny is an interesting character. She’s set in her ways and a little bit eccentric. Something from her past will be brought back up changing everything for her.

A well-written, non-cozy mystery that tales us on a journey of self-discovery and healing. An intriguing read with an interesting premise.

**Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for an electronic ARC and the opportunity to review this book.

I was pre approved for this ARC due to my love for the Finlay Donovan series but this book doesn’t seem to overlap the same genres. Lenny Marks lacks the humor and elements of ridiculous adventure that fuel the Finlay Donovan books.
However, I did still enjoy this book for what it was even though the comparison to one of my all time favorite series led me to believe it was going to be a completely different reading experience.
Thank you to NetGalley and St Martin’s Press for this digital ARC in exchange for my honest review.

Lenny Marks I love you, girl! I wanted to reach right into the pages of this book and give Lenny a great big giant hug, even though I know she wouldn't like it! :)

I have a strong affinity for the stories with neurodivergent female main characters. The ones I've read have characters that struggle with the everyday, but find a way over and through it. Lenny Marks was no different. Hers might be the most touching of all of these stories I've read. Lenny's story starts with a letter she gets, but clearly wants nothing to do with. Through flashbacks, the mysterious layers of Lenny's childhood and teen years are slowly revealed. And as she comes to terms with her past, the people she tries to avoid and push away become so, so important to her.

My only beef with this book (and it's not even an issue with the book itself) is that it's labeled as a mystery/thriller. While there is a touch of mystery surrounding Lenny's past, it definitely doesn't feel like the front and center focus. And I definitely wouldn't call it a thriller. I would label it more as contemporary or literary fiction.

I love, love, love this book. I love, love, love Lenny and all of the people that surround her. This book is a testament to the power of friendship and found family. It shows the importance of having strong character and standing up for your convictions, even when it's not easy. We all could learn a lot from the lessons and wisdom Lenny imparts.

Thanks to NetGalley for the free advance copy of Lenny Marks Gets Away With Murder by Kerryn Mayne.

I absolutely loved this book! Lenny Marks is a quirky elementary school teacher, a mostly socially inept loner who lives in alone, collects copies of The Hobbit, watches reruns of Friends and plays Scrabble against an imaginary Monica Geller. It's clear from the get-go that something traumatic happened in Lenny's childhood, but the details are left locked away both for the reader and for Lenny herself. As the novel progresses, we get to root for Lenny as she comes out of her shell, deals with her past, and makes real friends, not just imaginary ones. The writing style, while fresh and unique, did remind me of another favorite recent series, Nita Prose's The Maid and her wonderful protagonist, Molly.

This was one of the best books of the year for me, and it's hard to believe it's a debut. I can't wait for more from Kerryn Mayne. Five enthusiastic stars.

With a shaky start calling out happiness as unstable and unreliable I wondered where Lenny Marks was going to take me. Not very far, but that doesn’t mean that there isn’t a great story in the short distance. Lenny Marks is a marginalized character, partly by her childhood, partly by her current life, partly by the self-important people that surround her, but maybe mostly by herself. She is organized, she is a planner, and not much for social nuances which inevitably trip her up. Her brain works differently and therein lies the hook that makes you hope for her best outcome. She is in her thirty-seventh year with expectations that are below middling.

Lenny has a limit for “polite interactions and pleasantries” and when time is up she needs to leave. Making friends has been challenging but Lenny has her supporters and they help to shore up Lenny and this story. We know something bad has happened to her, we know that it is going to come out and we know that how Lenny deals with it is going to make or break this book. I loved that Lenny could take on a bad-ass, steal a dog and shelter it with the love and affection that she has never enjoyed. She can’t fail someone again, even if she can’t remember who it was or why she had failed. If anything I would have liked to have had more of the backstory verified earlier but the mechanics worked and I kept reading and rooting for Lenny.

So glad I requested and received a copy of this book. Kerryn Mayne has done an admirable job of weaving an important and affecting story about a woman who presents differently. I wish I had Lenny and her anagrams around when I am attempting to solve the NY Time word puzzles. Many thanks to St. Martin’s Press and NetGalley for a copy.

I went into this blind assuming it was a thriller about. murder. This was my mistake and so I had difficulty getting into the book to begin. However if you like a character driven story about living with trauma and forming friendships, this is a great book to pick up. I loved the cast of characters, each one unique and described so well that I could really picture them. I loved Lenny and her growth and this is a great twist on a murder mystery.

Lenny Marks has a very quiet, tucked in life. But her foster mother has been pushing her lately - get out, make friends, experience life. And just as Lenny has decided to do just that, something from her past comes back and makes her want to crawl away again.

I thought this was an interesting story but it lacked the punch I was hoping. I found the last few chapters pretty shocking and thought it was a little out of character for our MC. I thought the bad guys were just a little over the top - I'd liked them to seem a little less completely awful and maybe more of a gray area. But it was a cute, interesting read with twists I didn't see coming.

A huge thank you to the author and publisher for providing an e-ARC via Netgalley. This does not affect my opinion regarding the book.

My first thoughts as I started reading Kerry’s Mayne’s debut novel, LENNY MARKS GETS AWAY WITH MURDEr, we’re how does Lenny and her elementary students cope with Lenny’s autism. I like how the author has Lenny trying to have a social life with her fellow teachers. Lenny’s life changes when she receives a letter from the parole board about her father. We start getting glimpses of Lenny’s childhood and the events that led to her father going to jail. I love her relationship with her elderly neighbor. The book did take me a long time to read. I needed to put it down and start again a few times. There were so many threads of the story that needed to be put together. I plan on going back and rereading this book again as I think I might be able to enjoy it more. My thanks to St. Martin’s and NetGalley for a copy of this book. The opinions in this review are my own. 3 1/2 stars raised to 4 stars.

I thoroughly loved this book. Lenny Marks is one of my favourite heroines of all time. I loved her personality and I loved the little mysteries sprinkled through the story until the big mystery was revealed at the end. I will definitely watch for other books by Kerryn Mayne in the future!

I truly enjoyed this story about Lenny Marks, a woman who underwent a traumatic childhood resulting in some compulsive behaviors in adulthood. I enjoyed having a neurodivergent main character a la "Elenor Oliphant" or "The Maid," and seeing how Lenny navigates through life. When she starts to stray from her normal routine, it seems that everything that she has every believed to be true is put into question. Lenny is a character who I will not forget easily. There was such incredible development of her, and the reader got piece by piece of her history, with the full events behind many of Lenny's actions finally being revealed. I just wanted to give her a hug! The side characters were so charming as well, with Malcolm the dog definitely stealing the show. I truly enjoyed this book, and look forward to reading more from this author.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publishers for an advanced copy of this book. All opinions within this review are my own.

Lenny Marks is one of the quirkiest characters I have read about recently and that is what makes this story so good.

This one is a slow start, so if you find yourself wanting to stop, hang in there. Once it gets going, it really picks up and you can’t help but keep reading.

A letter upends Lenny’s life. As she learns more and begins to truly remember what happened versus what she thought happened, you will cheer her on.

This book will break your heart and warm your heart and I am so glad I had the opportunity to read it.

Thank you to St. Martin’s Press for the copy of this book. All views are my own.

If you're anything like me, you will absolutely love Lenny Marks and you will find yourself rooting for her every step of the way. Lenny lived through a traumatic childhood which made her the "quirky" adult she is today. She just wanted to be seen and liked, like most humans. It was so compelling peeling off the layers of her life and finally getting to the core of who Lenny is. This book was not at all what I expected; it turned out to be so much better; it was a delightful read with a lot more depth than I had anticipated and I thoroughly enjoyed it. Thanks to the author, NetGalley and St. Martin's Press for an ARC in exchange for my honest opinion.

Lenny Marks lives a quiet lift. She likes being alone in her little house. Although she has Monica, from the TV series, with her when she wants to play Scrabble or needs to say she already has plans with her "roommate". Lenny doesn't have real friends. Soon she has a dog named Malcolm to keep her company. Lenny's mom is always urging her to make new friends, to get out more, to do things with others. So Lenny is trying, not very successfully, to become friends with the "cool girls" at work. She has trouble reading people and often misinterprets what they are thinking or meaning.

Lenny's stepfather is soon to get out of prison. He is the reason people left her - why everyone leaves her. Lenny's stepfather's voice runs through her thoughts - "this is your fault".

It was a slow start to this book for me. But once I got into the story, I was hooked. I really loved this book. There is really so much more to Lenny Marks than meets the eye. She's amazing in her own special way. 5 stars for this reader. I'm not sure I would put it in cozy mystery genre.

Highly recommend this book. Thank you to St. Martin's Press and NetGalley for this ARC.

4.5⭐️

Lenny Marks Gets Away with Murder is a delightful and affecting tale with far more depth than I’d anticipated. Lenny Marks lives a small, carefully curated existence, avoiding socializing and the unexpected as best she can. That is, until something throws her off her axis and forces her to confront how she came to be this way- and if there is perhaps a better option out there. I found Lenny quite relatable, sometimes hitting a bit close to home, and I couldn’t help rooting for her more and more as the story progressed.

Thank you Kerryn Mayne, St. Martin’s Press, Macmillan Audio, and NetGalley for providing this ARC for review consideration. All opinions expressed are my own.

I'll be honest -- I wasn't sure if this book would be my cup of tea. But there was something compelling about the synopsis, and all of the glowing reviews I had seen online.

I'm glad I gave this one a chance. Lenny Marks Gets Away with Murder turned out to be an absolute delight to read. Fun, quirky and compelling, the first third moved a little slow, but quickly picked up. Lenny Marks is my hero of the year, and this should be everyone's Book Club pick this year!

Thank you to NetGalley and St. Martin's Press for an ARC in exchange for my honest review.

Thank you to the author Kerryn Mayne, publishers St. Martin's Press, and NetGalley for an advance digital copy of LENNY MARKS GETS AWAY WITH MURDER. All views are mine.

Everything seemed exactly like it had always been and Lenny couldn't quite work out why she wasn't satisfied with that anymore. p138

Dear Kerryn Mayne: your book reminds me of Sally Hepworth, so congratulations. And enjoy the many quibbles below, which I often also find with her books.

I recommend LENNY MARKS to readers of mysteries and family sagas, lovers of unlikable leads, and fans of ASD rep.

"Amy. I don't know that I particularly like you very much. But you should really like yourself better than this." ...Amy blanched and her face sagged with defeat. p242

Three (or more) things I loved:

1. Lenny isn't my favorite character ever, but she's more than a collection of stereotypes. She also an interesting person with interesting quirks, like the word game she plays with herself, and this: Lenny wished she could pull off nail polish. The few times she'd tried it, she ended up feeling like a child who'd raided her mother's makeup drawer. p57

2. This book is plot-strong and character-strong, proving a story doesn't need to be one or the other. *Plot weakens along the way. At the beginning of the book, Lenny really seems like she has a point to make, but the story quickly devolves into a scene-by-scene description of the fmc's day-to-day life.

3. Omg the posters!!!

4. This book strives to do a lot of things, but it only succeeds at one: it's a really good abuse/survivor narrative. Because it's fiction and not a memoir, it deals with the abuser using murder. It's a good reading experience to follow this line. Unfortunately, there are too many other things going on.

Three (or less) things I didn't love:

This section isn't only for criticisms. It's merely for items that I felt something for other than "love" or some interpretation thereof.

1. Check check, check for all the mindless stereotypes that authors plug into their ASD book characters. You authors are embarrassing yourselves, not ASD people.

2. Lenny's coping mechanisms are garbage and I would suggest no one to ever emulate them. For example, she rejects a friend's offer of immediate emotional support and labor, and instead tells herself to push it down and deal with it alone, even though doing so is very difficult for her.

3. The character is neurodivergent, not the narrator. It shouldn't read this way. This style is so dry I can't engage with it. All the sentences have simple form. Diction is pedestrian. The narrator, unless it's first person, doesn't reflect the characters' traits.

4. The climax occurs on page 195, making this book approximately 60 pages too long. In general, the pacing is very awkward. *edit This is actually the inciting incident! Why take this long to set up a book?

5. Lenny acts completely out of character in the climax, and therefore gets no resolution. It's just such a confusing read because the pace is everywhere.

6. The stand off between Lenny and her Rottweiler, and Jase, a drug dealer and the dog's former abusive owner, is such a ridiculous scene. The characters behave unnaturally. Not even the dog acts like a big dog facing his past abuser.

7. Once Lenny starts getting her stride, she's really a judgy bee. She's overtly mean to people. This whole book's value system on what makes someone likeable is a little *wiggles hand*.

8. The writing is not great. Complicated sentences are clumsy, like on page 174: "...she was ushered into the courtroom with unfamiliar faces everywhere except one."

Rating: 🦮🦮 "adopted" dogs
Recommend? sure
Finished: Jul 7 '24
Format: Digital arc, Kindle, NetGalley
Read this book if you like:
🔪 murder mysteries
👨‍👩‍👧‍👦 family stories, family drama
👭🏽 women friendships
💇‍♀️ women's coming of age
🐶 puppers
🔥 slow burn

I absolutely loved this book! Brilliantly written and so easy to get inside the mind of Lenny Marks! Lenny reminded me of a mix between Eleanor Oliphant and The Maid! She went through a traumatic childhood and struggles with social cues. There’s mystery and sadness but also laughs! I enjoyed seeing so much character growth throughout the story! I will read anything that Kerryn Mayne writes from here on out!