Beneath Devil’s Bridge by Loreth Anne White Is an Excellent read with many twists and interesting well developed characters. This novel draws its from the 1st page. The entire podcast involvement makes this all more relevant and timely. The switching in time is interesting and meaningful.
The story of Beneath Devil’s Bridge alternates between the past and the present. Generally it is between two female perspectives with a couple of others tossed in. The book begins with one of those different viewpoints. A 14-year-old girl who is going to be ruthlessly killed, we see that from her viewpoint as the first chapter fades to the following chapter. The book is absolutely a page-turner, and the writer skillfully makes little cliffhangers toward the finish of each chapters to keep you flipping the pages. While fictionalized, an actual gruesome killing inspired this novel.
20 years prior, Clayton Jay Pelley raped and killed his teenager student, Leena Rai. The evidence proved it. He also admitted the crime after that. Presently, Pelley has recanted that confession, asking for reinvestigation of the crime. For what reason is he recanting? Does he want to play with peoples heads? Or because he truly didn’t do it? That is the thing that Tiffany scott (a “true crime podcaster” searching for her first huge break) and Rachel Walczak (one of the investigators) need to know.
The lone thing I did not like about this novel was that in all the viewpoints characters sounded very similar. They did not have unique voices as they should have. The Loreth Anne White writing is suggestive, puts-you-there description, however it seemed like similar words were coming from every one of the characters’ mouths or were in their minds. In any case, this may not trouble you because the writer has made a compelling, page-turning read.
Beneath Devil’s Bridge by Loreth Anne White is my first novel by this author and It is very well written. The characters are well drawn and interesting, some are truly likeable and some are not. I’m especially liked the way Ms. White has figured out how to “breath life” into a victim who has been dead for quite a long time. This kind of writing is not a simple task for an author. Her writing style reminded me little of Tana French and some of John Grisham’s works. Fans of those authors may well appreciate “Beneath Devil’s Bridge”.
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