Cheri Reviews Orphan X and Chase Darkness with Me – 2019 Books 54 & 55

Orphan X (Orphan X, #1)Orphan X by Gregg Hurwitz
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Part of me wishes I hadn’t reread this one. I mean, I still enjoyed it but I did get caught up more in the bullshit moments and with just how bad Evan’s judgement was. It was pretty bad. I still plan to keep rereading the next two books in the series so I can dive into the fourth. It’s been out for a while now and I’ve been staring at the ARC paperback the publisher sent me. It’s taunting me as a symbol of just how far behind I am in my ARC reading. Just so many books and so little time…

View all my reviews

Chase Darkness with Me: How One True-Crime Writer Started Solving MurdersChase Darkness with Me: How One True-Crime Writer Started Solving Murders by Billy Jensen
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

I’ve read a quite a bit of true crime over the past year or so and Chase Darkness with Me is one of my favorites. I was drawn to it for a few reasons: it was cheap on Audible, I loved Michelle McNamara’s I’ll Be Gone in the Dark: One Woman’s Obsessive Search for the Golden State Killer, and I fantasize about solving cold cases and wanted to read about someone who ended up doing it.

Jensen, who also narrates the book, lays out numerous cases that he worked on and I was interested in all of them. Whether it was the discussion of his methods or the family and friends of the victims, I had a tough time hitting pause to do other things.

Just like I did during and after reading I’ll Be Gone in the Dark, I hit reddit looking at cold cases and all the true crime subs I could find. Almost immediately I was overwhelmed by just how many cases there are being talked about. And also by the daunting task of figuring out where to get started on even picking a case to start researching. The author clearly expects readers to feel this way and devotes time in an addendum to the book giving steps to follow to get started. I’ve already created my new reddit account and email address.

Jensen is coming to a local bookshop in the next few days and I’ve got my tickets to hear him speak. I’m hoping he’ll offer some more tips on being a citizen detective.

View all my reviews

2 comments

  1. I hate it when a book isn’t as good as I remembered it. I enjoyed it when I read it – and I’m going to read the next couple in the series. Pure escapism … so crank your bullshit meter down. 🙂

Leave a Reply

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.