🐰 BOOK / REVIEW 🐰

I never wait to read a book by @jesslourey (regardless of the official #pubdate happening in September 2024 🫠) because I am obsessed with writing. Thank you, @netgalley and #thomasandmercer, for my #ARC - I finished this in 24 hours!

#thereaping DID NOT DISAPPOINT 👏. I went in completely blind and this book terrified me if I am honest. We get reintroduced to Van Reed and Harry Steinbeck, whom I adored in #thetakenones, and their characters really blossomed. It was nice to learn more about their past, even if those revelations and secrets were hard to share. Part of me also feels like their could be a romance coming between the 2 - and I am not sure how I feel about it.

The setting of Alku and CCTC (a nursing home for #serialkillers) was horrifying 😱. Cell room 36 and the creepy atmosphere surrounding this town add such an awesome element to the story. Not to mention the INSANE traditions that the town holds (I don't want to give too much away) and the gruesome murders. It was delightfully f*cked in the best ways possible.

Do not read this one at night!!!

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

This one started out a little slow for me but then picked up. I kept trying to figure it out and put the pieces together before the detectives but I never did! I liked how their relationship grew a little stronger and they felt they could open up to each other a little bit more. I really enjoyed this one and loved the bomb drop in the epilogue. I was absolutely not expecting that!

For fans of Wendy Corsi Staub, you'll absolutely love Jess Lourey! "The Reaping" is book two in the Steinbeck and Reed series. What a book!

Wow, what an amazing book. I was captivated from the start – I’ve read the previous Steinback and Reed mysteries and couldn’t wait to see what would happen in this one. Agents Harry Steinbeck and Evangeline Reed are working together again on a case in Alku, Minnesota. It’s a very tight-knit community of Finnish families whose ancestors immigrated a few hundred years ago and founded the town. Their complete control continues to this day. Harry and Van are investigating a recent murder that is connected to a cold case homicide when an entire family was murdered in their home as they slept. Alku has already seen so much tragedy and yet, it continues.

While Harry and Van are investigating, the children begin to disappear. They can’t believe what’s happening – haven’t these people suffered enough? But the more Harry and Van try to help, the more closed off the community becomes. Wouldn’t they fully cooperate to keep their people safe? Or does this town have darker secrets than anyone suspected?

Not to be gruesome, but there are some gory details to the crimes in this book that I just loved. It’s a pleasant change to your typical shootings and stabbings. And the way the author describes the eeriness of the townspeople is so vivid that it will stick with you long after you finish the book. The whole story stuck with me; I couldn’t stop thinking about it. And that ending?! How am I possibly supposed to wait for the next installment? You have to read this book - it will leave you riveted and in serious anticipation for what comes next!

This is an action packed story with seriously creepy vibes that border on horror - and I'll be the first to admit that I am not a fan of the latter genre. But Jess Lourey has an undeniable gift for exploring the dark side of humanity, and she's done a great job with this book.

A quarter-century-old cold case appears to be coming back to life with a vengeance, as Steinbeck and Reed - an unusual dream team of investigators, given their opposing personalities and habits (which nevertheless make for some interesting chemistry) - soon discover.

The recent emergence of a similar case, which has the MO of one particular convicted criminal all over it, forces them into revisiting the mass murder of a family that took place in a small village named Alku, in Minnesota, many years ago. Unfortunately the criminal concerned has been in prison for some time, so could not have committed this murder himself.

Meanwhile, Alku has its own ghosts - and that refers not just to the spirits of the murdered family members in the mass killing case. Ancient Finnish traditions based on the heritage of the original settlers of the village are brought to life in re-tellings of the various legends and bloodthirsty superstitions of this community.

But the bottom line is, children from this village are continuing to disappear. Who is taking them - and why? Steinbeck and Reed need to find out what is going on quickly before any further tragedy occurs. This one is well worth a read.

OMIHECK! What an incredible book! Murder, mystery, horror, and the absolutely perfect detective team to solve it all!

When Jess Lourey created the team of Steinbeck and Reed (first in the Amazon e-novella “Catch Her in a Lie,” then in last year’s novel “The Taken Ones”), I was immediately pleading to the author to make a series out of the Minnesota odd couple, a forensic scientist and a cold case investigator. Harry Steinbeck is the uptight, by the book, dapper guy; Evangeline Reed is the impulsive, adventurous, messy type. Yet, they work beautifully together with their respectful banter and intelligent observations.

We know from the previous book and this one that Evangeline/Van also has a past as an abused child who escaped a cult and she has a supernatural skill: lucid dreams that lead her to the identities of truly bad people. Only now is Harry mostly comprehending her special talent. And in this novel, more of Harry’s past comes to light: he had a sister, Caroline, who was kidnapped without a trace when she was ten. Harry and Caroline’s imperious mansion-dwelling mother is still blaming him (as he is) and the long ago unsolved crime is part of the background since Harry and Van are near Duluth, the vicinity of Harry’s enduring angst.

Harry and Van were called north to investigate a heinous murder that matches a 25 year old cold case that took the lives of an entire family, all 5 shot and then bludgeoned horrifically (including a baby). The modus operandi then, and now, matches the deviant methods of convicted “Matty the Mallet.” But also then and now, Matty was securely locked away in a conveniently nearby hospital for the criminally insane, and is hobbled by wasting legs after a stroke.

The town where the murders took place is Uusialku, or Alku, an atmospherically super creepy village founded over a hundred years ago by seven families who were banished from Finland. Alku remains spiritually bonded together and the inhabitants seem to share a distinct craniofacial abnormality of long necks and too high foreheads. The residents also apparently have retained some secretive Scandinavian pagan folk rituals (uh, have you seen the film “Midsommar”? Those vibes.) And like other American parents warning their kids of the boogeyman, they have the Veri Noita, a Finnish Blood Witch, searching for naughty children whose toes she’d eat like grapes. Lourey’s last novel “The Taken Ones” had Bendy Man (Slender Man’s flexible family member), but the Blood Witch wins the creepy contest. The local children also partake in an Easter ritual that is akin to Halloween trick and treating — going door to door in animal masks and chanting “Your oven will break and I’ll make you ache unless you give me cake!” How adorable.

The tone is continuously spine-chilling, eerie, terrifying, sinister and WEIRD. But it’s action-packed as Harry/Van persist in trying to solve cold case mass murder for the sake of the current generation of children (there are some cuties) and finally determine what “the reaping” means. This book can definitely be read as a standalone novel, and it might be crossing into the horror category. Author Lourey has really nailed the pervasive tension-inducing mood. Harry and Van are such a terrific partnership, even with their unusual pasts, and they deserve more installments to their series. 5 stars!

Literary Pet Peeve Checklist:
Green Eyes (only 2% of the real world, yet it seems like 90% of all fictional females): NO Evangeline does get greenish-gray circles under her eyes.
Horticultural Faux Pas (plants out of season or growing zones, like daffodils in autumn or bougainvillea in Alaska): NO But there are cheerful daffodils trying to peek through the spring snow, even in Alku.

Thank you to Thomas and Mercer and NetGalley for a free advanced reader copy in exchange for an honest review!

Steinbeck and Reed are back! I was so excited to read “ The Reaping” after the ending in “The Taken Ones” left me wanting (needing) to know more. “The Reaping” is a story about a cold case in a Minnesota unincorporated village that keeps to themselves. I loved how the author made you feel like you were digging into the secrets of the town with the main characters. This one is told from 3 view points like the last but left me a little confused. I wish the author had explained a little more about Rannie in the first chapter before jumping into his point of view. I really got into this book about half way through and couldn’t put it down. After this ending, I’m ready for the next one!
Thank you to the author, publisher and NetGalley for the ARC.

Jess Lourey does it again! Every one of the books I’ve read by her are tense, creepy, and thrilling. I especially love the dynamics between Harry and Van, and in this installment we get to learn more about Harry’s origins and backstory. Plus the setting is familiar as I’m from the Duluth area. Like many of her books, I can’t put them down and finished this in one day. The ending sets us up for wanting more and discovering more connections between Harry and Van! Five stars!!!
Thank you to NetGalley, Jess Lourey, and the publisher for an advanced read copy!

The Reaping is a follow up book to The Taken Ones by Jess Lourey. Reed and Steinbeck are officially a team when they are looking into a cold case in the Duluth area. The location brings back ghosts for Harry Steinbeck that include his missing sister. The duo also get tangled up in a small town with unusual roots and traditions that will do anything to protect their town including protecting a killer and kill their own.

Jess Lourey is an automatic read for me now. They always come through with the perfect amount of creepy and spooky, and the characters are on point.