Catch Her When She Falls

Interesting Story That Could Have Been Better Told. IF you complete this tale, you'll get one that is ultimately an interesting story more of descent into paranoia than of uncovering the truth of a murder, one where the author chooses an ending that is less conventional and therefore more interesting. IF. The singular biggest problem with this tale is that the way it is told makes it Just. So. BORING. As in, even I caught myself falling asleep to it as quickly at times as if I was trying to read a Chemistry textbook. As in, this could rival the first three chapters of The Great Gatsby for most boring tale ever told. But again, IF you can survive the boring manner in which the story is told, it is quite interesting. Fans of other hyper-boring yet massively successful books like The Road by Cormac MCCarthy may be better suited to this book than I was. Recommended.

I've just finished “Catch Her When She Falls”, the story of a set of small-town friends: Micah, her HS boyfriend Alex, her best friend Emily, Emily's brother Jonah and Ryan, a fellow classmate. When Emily loses her life from a fall out a window during a party in the woods, Alex is tried and sent to prison as the killer, based partly on Micah's recanting of the alibi she originally furnished him. Flash forward to present day; Ryan and Micah are now living together and Alex is up for parole. This news sends Micah into a tailspin as she begins to question whether he was guilty after all. She's has never been sure what happened that night so she takes on the role of amateur sleuth. She tracks down facts, questions eyewitnesses, and searches her own memory for clues. When she stumbles across a true crime chat room, and assumes a false identity online, she provokes the wrath of another classmate Julie who has formed a relationship with Alex while he's been incarcerated. Before long, Micah's imagining people gossiping about her, following her down the street, and breaking into her apartment. In her zeal to solve the mystery, she even drives hundreds of miles to talk to Jonah, who has rebooted his life under a new name.

I found some of Micah's machinations a bit obsessive and over-the-top as she flips between suspects, doubting everyone, neglecting her coffee shop, and making assumptions that only serve to feed her growing paranoia. The ending needed a bit more grounding to make it believable, and I'm not sure all the blind alleys were sufficiently explained but the book did keep me engaged in trying to figure out the mystery and the characters were well drawn so it's four stars for me.

Thanks to NetGalley for providing me with an ARC in exchange for my honest review.