Review: Ill Will

I received an ARC of this book from the publisher in exchange for an honest review. This did not affect my opinion of the book or my review itself.

Title: Ill Will
Author: Dan Chaon
Publication Date: March 7, 2017
Genre: Mystery/Suspense/Psychological/Thriller
Recommended If You Like: experimental writing styles, multiple perspectives, crimes from the past colliding with crimes from the present, psychology

The Book:

Told from multiple perspectives, this is the story of a crime from the past that occurred during the Satanic Panic, as well as crimes occurring in the present that may be committed by a serial killer known by the moniker "Jack Daniels".

What I Liked:

Chaon does a really great job of exploring what exactly truth means for each character. Is it okay to lie on the witness stand if you still really think the accused did it? How do we lie to ourselves? To our friends and family? Do we rewrite our own pasts to make us feel more comfortable with our choices?

The mysteries are definitely intriguing and kept me interested. And the twist to the present mystery caught me completely by surprise, which I absolutely loved.

Anything I Didn't Like?

Sometimes it seems like Chaon gets too experimental, almost as if he is doing experimental for experimental's sake. Some pages have three different perspectives running in three different columns all on the same page, which was used too frequently and got confusing towards the end, taking me out of the book. There are also sentences that just end, with words missing. I'm not sure if these are typos or if this is what Chaon intended, but there are a lot of them and it is distracting.

So...?

While I like my mysteries completely resolved, I still enjoyed this book, It's definitely different and interesting, and the mysteries will keep you guessing and keep you invested.