BURN OUR BODIES DOWN

A 17-year-old Nebraska girl’s desperate search for her roots takes her down a path more twisted than she could have imagined.

Margot Nielsen has lived her whole life under the thumb of her emotionally distant, manipulative mother and her strange set of rules. They have no connections to any family that Margot is aware of, but when a clue about their family history surfaces, Margot follows it. She finds the grandmother her mother never wanted her to know living on the family homestead in an economically depressed town where the Nielsen name seems to be shrouded in a cloud of suspicion that inspires trepidation among locals. Despite ominous foreshadowing, Margot still longs to find in her stoic grandmother, Vera, the love and connection that have been withheld from her. Their relationship is quickly complicated by a fire on the farm that results in the death of a girl with an uncanny physical resemblance to Margot—and whose existence her grandmother refuses to explain. Tension builds as the questions pile up, though the clues do not keep pace with the gaping concerns that readers are forced to grapple with. What could have been a tightly paced thriller suffers from pacing issues and plot holes along with thin character development and repetitive language. All major characters are white.

A sinister story about the vicious cycle of generational abuse that falters under the weight of an unwieldy plot.