Disclaimer: I received this e-arc from the publisher. Thanks! All opinions are my own. 

 

Book: The Sorority Murder 

 

Author: Allison Brennan 

 

Book Series: Standalone 

 

Rating: 4/5 

 

Recommended For...: mystery, thriller 

 

Publication Date: December 28, 2021 

 

Genre: Thriller Mystery 

 

Recommended Age: 18+ (violence, gore, language, death) 

 

Explanation of CWs: The book focuses on a murder that happened and it has violence, death, and gore in it. There is also some cursing in it. 

 

Publisher: MIRA 

 

Pages: 448 

 

Synopsis: Lucas Vega is obsessed with the death of Candace Swain, who left a sorority party one night and never came back. Her body was found after two weeks, but the case has grown cold. Three years later while interning at the medical examiner's, Lucas discovers new information, but the police are not interested.
 
 Lucas knows he has several credible pieces of the puzzle. He just isn't sure how they fit together. So he creates a podcast to revisit Candace's last hours. Then he encourages listeners to crowdsource what they remember and invites guest lecturer Regan Merritt, a former US marshal, to come on and share her expertise.
 
 New tips come in that convince Lucas and Regan they are onto something. Then shockingly one of the podcast callers turns up dead. Another hints at Candace's secret life, a much darker picture than Lucas imagined—and one that implicates other sorority sisters. Regan uses her own resources to bolster their theory and learns that Lucas is hiding his own secret. The pressure is on to solve the murder, but first Lucas must come clean about his real motives in pursuing this podcast—before the killer silences him forever. 

 

Review: I loved the premise of this book! I like that the MC has a podcast and that he is into true crime. The book is told in kind of a true crime podcast fashion as well, which is so much fun. I loved how the characters were developed and how the world was built. I also thought the mystery worked well for the most part and the plot kept me interested in the story enough to find out what happened at the end. 

 

However, the pacing is so so slow in this book in the beginning and it picks up in the middle. The book is a bit of an info dump in the beginning, which put me off of it for a bit. The book spends a lot of time going back over old evidence and repeating the same thing over and over again. The ending was also a bit of a letdown and it kind of was outside of the realm of expected. 

 

Verdict: it was good.