I first starting reading books by Maureen Johnson with her Truly Devious series. Truly Devious’ third book was one of my favorite reads in 2020. The original trilogy had me in a trance and I honestly loved every second of it. Then came The Box in the Woods. Then Nine Liars. While not as great as the original three, I still enjoyed these mysteries tremendously. I was hoping that Death at Morning House was going to be the next book in the series, but this is a completely separate story from Stevie Bell. This is totally okay, but the story itself had it’s ups and downs, which I’ll talk more about below.

This book is told in two alternating timelines with present day and the mystery of the deaths of the Ralston children in the 1930s. You get several POVs from the 1930s, but only Marlowe’s from the present. While I didn’t mind this back and forth much (I enjoyed it a lot with the Truly Devious series), I found myself liking the past POV and timelines more than the present ones. Maybe I just didn’t connect with Marlowe much and felt closer to Clara, but regardless, I was a little bored during present day tellings until the end of the novel. 

Marlowe is an odd main character if I’m being honest. She had this weird tendency to narrate as if the story already happened but then also talking about it like it was just happening at that moment. It honestly wasn’t necessary to do that “breaking the fourth wall” or whatever and really took me out of the story. Not to mention, there were random moments when she was just like, “Oh, I do logic puzzles” and then spat out the whodunit. I didn’t truly like any of the characters from present day if I’m being honest and preferred the past POV from the Ralston children. 

As far as the ending goes, the Ralston’s mysterious deaths wrapped up in a way that felt satisfying and not too neat. The present mystery wrap up, though? It honestly felt like such a complete mess and too… easy. I don’t know, the whole thing just felt off and I really didn’t like it. 

Spoilers ahead. 

I felt really bad for Max. I’m not sure if Maureen Johnson wrote him to be a little terror of a four-year-old so you didn’t feel as traumatized when his big sister, Unity, literally drowns him, but I still felt traumatized. Like, that little boy didn’t have to die. He acted out because of the literal psychopath of a father he had. It was just depressing that it ended the way it did. Also, with Clara being one of my favs, of course she ended up dying. 

One thing I will say is that I really loved the letter from Dagmar. It felt fitting that she caused the accident on the lake that took hers and Unity’s lives. While the wrap up for the past was depressing as hell, it still felt satisfying in the grand scheme of the mystery. 

For the present, though? Did anyone else just feel like Maureen Johnson randomly picked one of the friend group to be the scapegoat for Chris’s and Dr. Henson’s deaths? Was that just me? Because honestly that’s what it felt like by April being the culprit. I don’t know, that whole thing felt wonky to me. 

Overall, the mystery was fun, but most of the present day characters felt lackluster. I enjoyed the past in the book more than the present. A good read, but not something that will blow your mind. 3.5/5 stars rounded up for the social platforms. 

Source: Audiobook from Audible

(P.S. You can read this book for free by signing up for a free trial of Audible, which gives you two free audiobooks of your choice!)