A very different coming of age story told by a first generation Indian-American in a western state. Her mother has emigrated to the United States, is married to an American working on oil rigs, which keeps him away from his family for long stretches of time. Our narrator's uncle, aunt, and cousin come from India to live with them for awhile but all is not well and our narrator, Georgie, begins her story with a confession: she and her sister Agatha Krishna have murdered their uncle! This is a story of racism, abuse, immigrants, teenagers, and family. It is filled with magazine style quizzes, the kind teenagers love to take, which add some comic relief; but it is also filled with a lot of distrust and anger, common also in teens but here with an ominous twist. Nina McConigley makes the reader both a confidante and an antagonist. I found this debut novel very compelling.

Thanks to Netgalley and Pantheon for the chance to read this ARC!

Wow this is incredibly written. I loved the dark humor and nostalgic vibe. This goes much deeper than the surface.

It's filled with sisterhood, wit, loss of innocence, seeking justice, and so much more.

First off, many thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for this Advanced Readers Copy in exchange for an honest review. From the book blurb, the title, and the cover, I thought I'd be reading a socially-resonant dark comedy—where the trauma at the root of the novel is more rooted in metaphor. Without a content warning, I wasn't sure what I was getting into.

While it isn't the dark comedy I'd expected, this book *is* funny. Georgie's voice is distinct and clear, parsing major themes of colonialism, racism, and class, with 80's nostalgia in high doses. I just wish I'd known that the traumatic events leading to the titular murder are a far cry from campy metaphor. (I had expected a story more like, say, "My Sister, the Serial Killer," where, yes, lots of people are murdered, but the story itself is more about what it's like to clean up the messes your family make.)

Georgie and Agatha will stick with me for a long time. It really is a well written and well told story. I hope readers who come to this novel are better prepared for the tonal shifts within the book than I was.

This is such smart storytelling. There were so many juxtaposed double entendres, and I found myself highlighting meaningful quotes that stuck with me throughout the book. Some include:
"Is it a blessing to be able to speak? Is it a blessing to tell the truth?"
"And in the end: Remember to pose with your prize. Is it a fish? Is it a marriage? Are they really so different?"
"But were we really sinners if all we wanted was to be safe?"
I thought I may feel frustrated that we knew the ending from the jump, but I was deeply mistaken. The journey through which Georgie, a fantastic narrator, takes us is memorable, thought=provoking, and nostalgic of the 80s.

Welcome to rural Wyoming in the summer of 1986, where the air is dry, the shoulder pads are big, and the Creel sisters are plotting a murder. Or, depending on how you interpret this genre-defying, gloriously weird novel, they’re plotting their independence, their identity, or just how to make sense of an unbearably complicated world. Either way, it’s going to be a ride.

Told through the whip-smart, wickedly funny voice of Georgie Ayyar, this novel is equal parts murder mystery (sort of), coming-of-age saga, family portrait, and 80s time capsule—complete with magazine quizzes, sarcastic inner monologues, and cultural commentary so sharp it practically winks at you. When Georgie and her sister Agatha Krishna decide their newly arrived uncle from India has to go, the story kicks off with humor, heart, and just the right amount of chaos.

This book is fun—not in a fluffy way, but in a “laugh while flinching” kind of way. It takes big swings: at colonialism, generational trauma, racism, and the stifling expectations of girlhood—all while delivering snappy one-liners and sibling dynamics so vivid they’ll make you want to call your sister (or maybe not).

The publisher provided ARC via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

If How to Commit a Postcolonial Murder were a BuzzFeed quiz, the answer would definitely be f) all of the above—and maybe throw in g) wildly clever and weirdly hilarious for good measure. This debut novel reads like a diary written in glitter pen and annotated with biting footnotes, as tween Georgie Ayyar walks us through a summer of family chaos, cultural collision, and—oh yes—plotting her uncle’s murder (casually blaming the British Empire along the way).

"But do you know what pioneers do? They colonize. They take things that aren't theirs." ... "We had to become pioneers if we were going to kill him. We had to do what was best for us, no matter how it might affect other people. That's what pioneers do. That's what colonizers do."

Reading this book felt like listening to a new friend tell a story. The writing was natural and conversational, which automatically endeared me to the book off the bat. Up front, the narrator promised to tell a story of a murder, but not in the way you would expect. Before the murder is discussed, Georgie, the narrator, unpacks bits and pieces of her life as a young Indian woman (emphasis on Indian, descended from India, not Indigenous American) growing up in Wyoming with an Indian mother and a white father.

The story is full of nostalgia, wit and humor, but equally chock full of pain, abuse, sisterhood, survival and the instability caused by growing up being labeled as "other" by your peers and neighbors. The book, like the narrator Georgie, can be described as being between two worlds.

This book, the format, and the authors voice, are all so unique and original. I couldn't put this book down. I was hooked from the start and I happily read it in two days. Bonus points because the book also contained a lot of lists (my personal fav), itemizations of feelings and fly fishing (cast/caste), some drawings (MASH forever, iykyk!), and teen magazine quiz intermissions between chapters.

One of my favorite lines in the book is about Sacagawea and Georgie says, "I wondered, if when Sacagawea got to Oregon, she'd felt relieved to have made it, or if she just worried about that these two men were going to make her do next." It's such a perfect line (and also.. so true?).

This book was absolutely wonderful and I highly recommend it for anyone who is looking for a fun but impactful read. Beautifully done.

Thank you, Pantheon and NetGalley for the eARC!

Nina McConigley’s How to Commit a Postcolonial Murder is the rare kind of novel that makes you laugh, ache, and question everything—all in the span of a few pages.

Set against the wide-open backdrop of 80's rural Wyoming, the novel follows the Creel sisters - Georgie Ayyar and Agatha Krishna—two Indian-American sisters trying to make sense of their world, their family, and their place in a country that barely sees them. When they welcome their newly arrived relatives from India into their already chaotic home, tensions mount—and tragedy strikes. Georgie's narration, full of dark humor, magazine quizzes, and teenage logic, invites you into a story that's as much about survival as it is about identity.

At its heart, this is a novel about the violence that lingers—through colonization, racism, family, and silence. You can feel the raw wound of being "the only Indian kids" in a small, often hostile town. McConigley captures it all with a voice that is fierce, funny, and painfully alive.

There’s a wild energy running through Georgie's confession—equal parts innocence and rage—and the result is a novel that feels totally unlike anything else I’ve read. This book will stick with me for a long time.

#Knopf #VintageAnchorPantheon #HowToCommitAPostcolonialMurder #NinaMcConigley #OwnVoices

Wow! This is the book I didn’t know I was looking for. It offers a harsh and required critique on the white experience, which is done so well, but that is just a part of this story. This is also an exploration of colonialism and the cracks in the historical foundation its created around the world for centuries.
The combination of narration, teen magazine quizzes, and letters is a unique and engaging way to let this story unfold. The narrator often speaks of matters of great significance with what I initially thought was nonchalance, which I found endearing, but came to quickly realize it was actually profound perspective and emotional intelligence (which I also found endearing).

This book explores grief, redemption, and family. If you don’t read this book, you can’t blame the British, you can only blame yourself!

Thanks to Netgalley and Pantheon for the ebook. This starts out like any story of a teen describing her life in rural Wyoming in 1986, except that this teen, Georgie Ayyar, has a mother from India and a father whose work takes him away from home for months at a time. When her uncle and his family arrive from India and move in with them, Georgie and her older sister, Agatha Krishna, decide that the uncle must be killed by them. Despite that, this is a mostly traditionally told coming of age story that also has tons of humor.

Reading How to Commit a Postcolonial Murder felt like stepping into a story that was as razor-sharp as it was deeply personal. It’s not your typical crime novel—if anything, it takes the genre apart and reassembles it into something far more layered and urgent. It’s literary, fierce, and unapologetically political, but never in a way that sacrifices character or story.

From the first page, I could feel the weight of history pressing in. The murder at the center of the novel is just one thread; what really pulses underneath is the ongoing violence of identity, assimilation, and erasure. The protagonist—caught between cultural expectations and harsh realities—navigates a world that doesn’t offer clean answers, and the novel leans into that discomfort in a way that feels intentional and honest.

What really stuck with me was how McConigley uses the genre to ask questions rather than provide closure. This isn't a story about solving a crime to restore order—it's about unearthing the rot that's already there, baked into the systems we move through every day. There's a sharp intellect at work here, but it’s grounded in emotion, in place, in memory.

Stylistically, it’s bold. There are moments where the prose feels like it’s actively resisting easy reading, forcing you to slow down, pay attention, and sit with the unease. And yet, it never feels inaccessible—just uncompromising in its vision.

This is the kind of book that lingers. It made me think, made me angry in all the right ways, and left me with more questions than answers—and honestly, I think that’s the point. If you're looking for a read that challenges the conventions of crime fiction while digging deep into the legacies of colonialism, identity, and survival, this one absolutely deserves your time.

I feel bad giving this such a low rating, but I couldn't quite connect with the writing or characters.

On the surface, How to Commit a Post-Colonial Murder is about two sisters who decide to kill their abusive uncle—but it’s really about so much more. Told through the voice of Georgie Ayar, a Wyoming girl with an Indian mother and a white father, it reads like a raw, sharp, and surprisingly funny confession. Georgie’s voice feels incredibly real—witty, clear-eyed, and relatable, even if her experience isn't yours.. The book weaves in historical anecdotes that speak to the long shadow of colonialism and white supremacy, not in an abstract way, but in the way it shapes real families and lives.

It’s also about girlhood and sisterhood, growing up in the mid-80s —watching Out of Africa, learning about Chernobyl, watching the Challenger explode on TV, hanging out in malls, doing cheerleading and summer camp. It captures that feeling of being split between cultures, of trying to figure out what “normal” even is, and constantly comparing your own strange experience to everyone else’s....and most importantly, knowing that abuse is absolutely not something anyone should put up with.

There’s so much packed into this story: loss of innocence, a craving for justice, the weight of history, the weirdness of childhood. And it all works. It’s dark, smart, funny, daring, and impossible to put down.