I Don't Care What This Book Is About, I'll Read It.

Hello!

If you’re like me, I bet you have at least one author whose new book you preorder without reading the synopsis. One whose backlist you keep on your shelf because you know, sooner or later, you’ll want to read from it. When I’m in one of those reading moods where nothing sounds quite right, I love knowing I can reach for a book by a trusted author and feel almost certain I’ll enjoy the reading experience.

For me, that kind of author trust happens gradually. I read one book by an author and love it. I few months later, after remembering what I loved about that book, I decide to try another by the same author. Then another. Before I know it, I’ve slowly become an author completist.

I never really set out with the goal of reading everything an author has written1. It just seems to happen with the writers whose stories stay with me months or years after reading. With each book I finish by the same author, I begin to recognize their fingerprints—the themes they return to, the kinds of characters they develop, the emotional resonance of how they tell their stories. Over time and reads, I’m no longer choosing a book because of the plot. I’m choosing it because I trust the person who wrote it.

One of my favorite parts of becoming an author completist is the anticipation that comes with a new release. It feels different from discovering a debut and taking a chance on someone new. There’s a familiar excitement in knowing I’m about to step back into a writer’s world again. It reminds me a little of catching up with an old friend. I don’t know exactly where the conversation will go, but I’m looking forward to spending time together.

Rene Denfeld is one of those authors for me. Her novels are beautifully written, well paced, and often heartbreaking, yet they’re always threaded with deep humanity. She published a new novel this week, which means I get to spend the next few days back in a world created by a writer I’ve come to trust completely.

Here’s my Rene Denfeld reading journey….

**I’m including my full written reviews of the earlier books (from back in my blogging days…the old days of long reviews:)

The Child Finder My review from 2017

Just when I think there's no possible way to tell a missing child story in an original, creative way along comes this beautifully written book by Rene Denfeld and just like that I'm a believer again. I don't typically toss out words like beautifully written when talking about a mystery but that word absolutely describes how I felt about this story and Denfeld's writing. There's something magical at work here and I'm unlikely to do this book justice with this review.

From the opening page I was drawn into the world of Naomi, a dedicated, bordering on obsessed child finder, who's come back to her home state of Oregon to search for Madison, a little girl who's been missing for three years. Madison and her parents had driven to the mountains to cut down a Christmas tree and in the blink of an eye a blizzard was upon them and Madison vanished. Naomi is the last resort for Madison's parents, as she has been for so many others, and she combines her skills as an investigator with her own life experience of knowing what it feels like to be found. You see, Naomi has a past very similar to those of the children she tries to find, only her memories of the early years of her life are very limited.

The plot flows and evolves brilliantly with the use of alternating POVs of Naomi and "The Snow Child" as well as thankfully short ones from Mr. B...you'll have to read to find out who he is! The way Denfeld paints a picture with words... of the forest and snow, the fascinating use of imagination to survive, the intense feelings of hope and despair, the longing to belong and experience love when pain and fear have been so prominent...it was all woven together to create images that were seared in my mind. She created an almost dreamlike quality with her writing that enabled me to get through what I will say were some tough aspects of this story as far as abuse, neglect, and child trauma goes. At no time, however, was any aspect "in your face" or gratuitous; rather, it was an element of the story that couldn't be avoided.

This is a wonderful and unique part mystery, part thriller, character driven novel that I couldn't put down. I loved how the author handled the ending and I have to say, my fingers are tightly crossed that we haven't seen the last of Naomi!

The Butterfly Girl My review from 2019

I have officially added Rene Denfeld to my list of auto buy authors. The Butterfly Girl is the sequel to The Child Finder and while I’d recommend reading that first, especially if you love atmospheric, tension filled mysteries, it’s not a necessity as Denfeld does a great job of including just enough of Naomi’s back story for you to understand her motivations and history.

This story is an intricately woven mystery that also manages to be a character driven story which alternates between Naomi, an investigator, and a 12 year old girl named Celia. Celia and her two friends are homeless and not only dealing with the daily struggle of trying to survive as children on the street, but also trying to evade a killer who’s kidnapping and murdering young, homeless girls.

There was so much I loved about this book from the lyrical, beautiful way that Denfeld writes, to Celia’s love of butterflies, libraries and books. This all spoke to me SO MUCH! I should note, there are parts that include limited details of child prostitution which are relevant to the story but heartbreaking nonetheless.

If you like mysteries with lyrical writing, characters that feel like real people and a plot that reveals itself puzzle piece by puzzle piece, this book is for you!

The Enchanted My review from 2019

After reading and loving The Child Finder and The Butterfly Girl, I hightailed it to my library and grabbed The Enchanted…that's how much I enjoyed Rene Denfeld's writing! All I knew before starting this was that it involved death row and prison...two buzzwords that will always grab my attention. If I could only use one word to describe this book it would be haunting.

The story is narrated in the third person omniscient by one of the inmates on death row and this was the PERFECT way to tell this story. We also do get to hear from the lady, the warden and the priest but it's all from an outside looking in perspective. The lady is there to investigate the case of York, an inmate scheduled for execution, but who may get off The Row if she finds enough evidence to convert his sentence.

Throughout the story we get an up close and personal look at life inside a prison and readers, it's not pretty. I have a background in criminology and psychology and this story put what I learned in both to the test. The author took so many themes...death row, putting children in adult prisons, compassion, vengeance, retribution, imagination...mixed it up and weaved a story that had me thinking and challenging my own views. This is by no means an easy read. On the contrary, it's quite dark and difficult and at times I wanted to jump ahead because the images were too painful to read about...the white haired boy will forever haunt me...but this is how our criminal justice system operates and I wanted to challenge myself to really think about parts of this book.

I absolutely loved the author's use of books and their ability to transport an inmate to magical places outside of his physical cell, as well as the mental cell he lived in. Now, whether he deserved the escape and temporary peace that reading and books brought him...that's one of the morally gray questions readers are presented with. That and the ending...I was very much left surprised and wondering..."what would I do?"

Sleeping Giants My thoughts from last week (I somehow missed the 2024 publication of this, so many thanks to readers in the Friday discussion who were raving about it recently!)

What it’s about- Twenty years ago, a nine-year-old boy was swept away by powerful waves on a remote Oregon beach, his body lost to the sea. Only a stone memorial remains to mark his tragic death. For most of her life, Amanda Dufresne had no idea she had an older brother named Dennis Owens, or that he had died. Retired police officer Larry Palmer is a widower with nothing but time and in need of a purpose. He offers to help Amanda find answers.

My Thoughts- Another opening scene that grabbed me from the first sentence and continued pulling me in with rising tension. I loved everything about this book—from the atmospheric setting of a “reform” school on the Oregon coast to the three main characters who felt like real people to the web of mystery surrounding the people in the community. This is not a fast paced thriller, yet I flew through it as if it were. One thing (there are many) Denfeld excels at is weaving themes of morality, trauma, right and wrong, compassion, hope, and resilience into a story that starts with a bang and never lets up.

I enjoyed attempting (and failing) to figure out the underlying mystery and I really loved getting to know Larry and Amanda. My heart broke for Dennis and the other children in the school. The very sad part is, I know Rene Denfeld knows of what she writes because when I was a foster care social worker many years ago, I worked with a child who had been through the “treatment” detailed in this story. Truly tragic. The ending was perfection.

Starting asap - The Talking Bone - from the publisher- compulsive, page-turning thriller inspired by her real life work exonerating innocents, a novel that asks how far we’ll go in our pursuit of the truth—an emotionally rich, beautifully written book about evil and people trying to do good in the world. I can’t wait to start it!

Now I’d love to hear from you….

Which author’s books would you buy—or borrow—without even needing to know what they’re about.

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