I was expecting a bit more from this story but at the same time it was enjoyable. Following Matt was probably the best way to do this story, he was the one character I could fully get invested in (which is good seeing as he is the main character). However, him being this young kid getting asked to do so much and wanting to tackle the world also made the story run on a bit.
There were times where I was fully engrossed in the story and excited to see the twists and turns and there were times where I just wanted it to be over. The whole thing at times felt like one long run on sentence in a good way. This book definitely did not rush the story, but this was a bit of a downfall as well. There were parts that were perfectly fleshed out, like when Matt was asked to run some errands for some people or when he was sneaking into these parties and things to get clues about where his sister has gone, but I found a majority of the book for me did not move quick enough. So much was just dragging on for me.
Overall, it was a good story with a mostly satisfying ending, but the multiple crimes/storylines I was trying to follow felt like too much at times. Thank you Netgalley for the chance to read this early! #Netgalley #AThousandSteps

I feel that I don’t pick up mystery/thrillers as often as I used to, but the late 1960’S setting of A Thousand Steps caught my attention. This is not only a mystery about the disappearance of the main character Matt Anthony’s sister but also a coming-of-age novel and commentary on the social divides at the time all in one. While I haven’t experienced this era firsthand, I’ve consumed a lot of content regarding it, and this has to be one of the best pieces by far to bring this time to life.

In fact, I would say that the execution of the setting makes this story so interesting. It not only adds much-needed depth to the plot but also adds to Matt’s growth as he encounters and reflects on experiences new to him in the search for his sister. Reading about the cultural divisions and now they tie into the plot as well (especially in terms of important decisions Matt has to make) gave me quite a bit to think about while reading, even in terms of the current political climate. Seeing this era from this perspective now, it’s interesting to think about how this pivotal time in history impacted us to this day.

That being said, this book will take on a slower pace to really set the stage for the story. There were also parts of this in the middle where even I personally thought the pacing and story progression was going a bit too slow. But if you enjoy mysteries intertwined with other genres and themes, then I’d highly recommend A Thousand Steps. Especially if you love books and movies set in the sixties.

What happens when your sister goes missing during the Summer of Eternal Love? Did she run away or was she kidnapped? This one was ok. The missing person story was good and had lots of angles to follow, but I found myself skipping pages when some of the description got long. The information about Laguna in the 60s was new to me and the relationships felt real. Overall good.

A Thousand Steps, by T. Jefferson Parker, is one part thriller and one part coming-of-age story. Given how much I adore novels that blend genres, I knew that I had to give this one a try!

The year is 1968, and Matt Antony lives in Laguna Beach, California. You'd think that would mean he has the world at his fingertips, but you'd be wrong. He's just a kid – a teenager that has no idea what to do with his life, or even where his next meal will be coming from,

Unfortunately, his life is about to get even more complicated as his sister vanishes. One moment she was here, the next, she was yet another missing person poster. And it's starting to feel like it's up to Matt to find her.

I went into A Thousand Steps expecting a dash of coming of age mixed in with my thriller. I wasn't expecting a heavy dose of historical fiction getting thrown into the mix. It was a pleasant surprise, one that set the scene nicely.

Despite the setting and some of the more extreme elements, this story's elements could resonate with any reader. Matt is just a kid who wants to find his way in the world. More than that, he wants to find a place where he's safe and loved. Who can't sympathize with that?

Naturally, it's easy to like and appreciate Matt's character. Especially as his determination brings him out into the world looking for his missing sister. It's an endearing move while also being the impetus needed for this novel.

Overall, I really enjoyed A Thousand Steps and would happily read anything else written by T. Jefferson Parker, given a chance.

This is a slightly quirky, dysfunctional family, mystery set in 1968 Laguna Beach California. Matt Anthony is the strangely stable kid with a brother fighting in Vietnam, soon to come home, and an older sister Jazz who is still in high school. At sixteen, he can drive his Mom's van but usually travels by bike to go fishing and precisely deliver papers for a little much needed cash. His mother has a big drug problem, barely pays the rent waitressing in a pirate themed restaurant and is tuned out of her children's lives a lot of the time. His father left long ago and contributes nothing. He's politically right wing, very into guns and pretends in phone calls to his son that he's there for him, but he never is. Matt and Jazz both do some work in an early version of a New Age bookstore and gallery. This is the summer that his long time crush has a crush back at him but another girl, who attends meetings at the retreat occupying acres on a hill also catches his eye. And along the way, Jazz disappears, the police say she's a runaway, odd factions in town seem to have unexpected connections, his mother moves the family to the part of town that is known for free living and drug use, and Matt's loyalties are all over the place, with one exception: He knows his sister did not run away. He knows she is being held somewhere against her will. And he will do all he can to save her. This is a cool pastiche of the era, with various points of view represented through fairly quick sketches but sufficient and engrossing. Matt is a great character. Enjoyed.

A coming-of-age crime novel, if there is such a genre. The reader gets an in-depth view of Laguna Beach, California circa Summer 1968. Apparently accurate details include (the author calls it home) Timothy Leary and spiritual leaders guiding seekers of enlightenment, and a time capsule of the city awash in LSD, drug smuggling and cops arresting hippies.

In this unique setting, sixteen-year Matt searches for his missing sister, two years his senior. Matt’s character is likable and well drawn. Desperately poor, he catches fish off the rocky shore of the Pacific to ward off the frequent hunger. He delivers daily newspapers on a heavy duty bicycle for twenty-five dollars a month. And in his spare time he pleads with the complacent police department to search for his sister, makes mysterious deliveries for suspect head shop owners, and falls in love.

The book developed the clues about the missing Jasmine quite slowly, but the narrative was enjoyable overall.

I was provided with a digital Advance Readers Copy of this title by the publisher through NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

I’m going with 3 stars for the story and 4 for nostalgia.

Taking place in California in the late ‘60s, this coming of age novel is filled with sex, drugs, Vietnam war, counterculture living, spiritual enlightenment, first love, dysfunctional families, hippies, the draft and a bit of rock ‘n roll. It mostly is true to the times and could easily be a YA book.

Thanks to NetGalley and Forge/Macmillan for the ARC to read and review.

It’s 1968 and the summer of love in Laguna Beach. Matt Anthony is just doing what he can to get by. His dead beat dad left years ago, his mother has a serious drug problem, his brother is fighting in Vietnam, and his sister has gone missing.

While working his paper route to keep food in his growing body, Matt does what he can to try to find his sister. The cops think she just another hippie run away, but Matt knows better. In his quest to find his sister, he sees the underbelly of the drug world fueling the LSD craze and does what he can to stay off the cops’ radar.

It took me quite a while to get into this book as there was a lot of attention paid to setting the counterculture scene of SoCal in the 1960s . I really liked Matt, he seems like a genuinely good human being stuck with a rather dysfunctional family. This book is hard to categorize as it has a coming of age/literary fiction feel in the first half, but then slides into a thriller when the search for Matt’s sister speeds up.

Overall it was an interesting read, and would maybe be of more interest for someone nostalgic of a past time period he or she was actually a part of, but for me it dragged a bit.

Thank you NetGalley, Forge Books, and of course T. Jefferson Parker for the advanced copy. All opinions are my own. A Thousand Steps comes out on January 11th.

Drugs and a missing girl

It's 1968 in Laguna Beach in southern California. Matt Anthony is a 16 year-old with a lot of responsibility on his plate. His dad left with another woman years ago and keeps in touch periodically. His mom works as a waitress (kind of) when she's not doing drugs. His older brother is a short timer getting ready to come home from Vietnam. And his sister Jazz just disappeared and the cops don't seem too worried about it even though another young girl showed up dead on the beach recently.

So it's up to Matt to try to find Jazz, when he's not delivering his newspapers or trying to find his next meal (a huge problem).

I used to read quite a bit of T. Jefferson Parker and enjoyed his police procedurals. This book is different from other books of his I've read but it is excellent and I highly recommend it especially if you're interested in the time period it's set in, like me, because it's definitely an accurate depiction. It was fun reading about everyday life in 1968 plus reading about the drug culture including Timothy Leary in that time period. Brought back memories for me.

I will definitely be picking up some more Parker books and reacquainting myself with this author.

I received this book from Forge Reads through Net Galley in the hopes that I would read it and leave an unbiased review.

This is my first book by this author. I will be looking for more. This one was very good.

This story is set in 1968. During the Viet Nam war and the hippie explosion. It's a typical California town but not such a typical family. The Anthony's are one messed up family. The mother a drug addict and the dad a deserter. A deserter to his family. He left for a better life several years prior. Another woman was involved too. The Anthony children are basically left to fend for themselves. The oldest boy is in the Army and stationed in Viet Nam. The daughter, Jasmine, seems to be a good girl but she disappears without a trace. The youngest boy, Matt, is a level headed young man who is beside himself with worry over his sister's disappearance. He will stop at nothing to find her. He also works hard. He has a newspaper delivery route and does other odd jobs to make money. I really liked and felt for Matt. He has a heart of gold and the will power of a saint.

This story will have you guessing what happened to Jasmine. Who or what took her. Did she leave on her own or did something horrible happen to her. At the beginning you read about another young girl, teenager, who's body was found so you wonder if the same will happen again. This story is about young love also. Though it's partly in the background you will root for Matt to find true love. Though he is only sixteen he is such a smart and resilient kid. He has several runs with the worst luck possible but never gives up. He is just a very likable kid.

I did not like either parent and thought they should be ashamed of themselves for how they treated their children. Not that either beat them but neglect was rampant. It was like the mother, Julie, didn't care if they had food or did their homework or anything. She stayed in her room most of the time smoking weed or worse. She did not seem to care about anyone but herself. The dad was just as bad if not worse in many ways. He had just left and didn't help out in any way. But when he did finally come back to help Matt look for Jasmine, the things or way he talked to me was quite silly for a grown man. He thought he was so much smarter than anyone else and was a bit condescending to Matt. And he even enticed Matt to drink alcohol. What kind of dad does that to a sixteen year old who already has the weight of the world on his shoulders? I just didn't like either parent.

I did like this book though. It's well written with just a few mistakes that I could easily overlook. It held my interest from page one and all was wrapped up by the end. Not a rushed ending either. This book makes you feel as if you are back in that time period. From the cop who rides around to just bust the hippies. The protestors of the war. The drug use. The way people talk. It takes you back for sure. If you are old enough that is.

Thank you #NetGalley, #TJeffersonParker, #Macmillan-TorForge for this ARC. This is my own true thoughts about this book.

5/5 stars from me. I recommend you read this one. It's really very good and in lots of ways a fun read. Edge of your seat in places too.

I had a hard time getting into this book. I think this might be a better beach read. The plot centers around a boy ,coming of age, looking for his missing sister. He encounters sex parties, lots of drugs and rock and roll.

A Thousand Steps is an enjoyable read if you really love the 1960's and everything "hippie". Sixteen year old, Matt, has a sister who has gone missing and he is frantic to use everything in his young, innocent arsenal to find her and bring her home. The setting is Laguna Beach, California, and the summer of love continues there in all it's drug-laced glory. This story includes dysfunctional parents and an older brother serving in Viet Nam. It includes young love, survival, and the law. Ultimately, it's the search that proves to be the backbone of the story, in the context of all the sex and drugs.

I enjoyed A Thousand Steps, but I did think it could have been edited down a bit. I might also have placed this in the "Young Adult" category, as the story is essentially told through the eyes of a teenager, and had it been in this genre, I would have given it 4 stars.

Thank you to Netgalley, for allowing me to read and review A Thousand Steps.

'Laguna Beach, California, 1968. The Age of Aquarius is in full swing. Timothy Leary is a rock star. LSD is God. Folks from all over are flocking to Laguna, seeking peace, love, and enlightenment.'


Coming-of-age tale doesn't quite do justice to this story. Basically 16-year-old Matt Anthony is in the process of raising himself with little to no help, financial or otherwise, from his absentee father - who phones in at irregular intervals with advice on being a "real" man - or his stoner mother - who is rapidly falling down the rabbit hole of the evolving hippie culture.

Matt's older brother, a tunnel rat in Vietnam, is due home in about six weeks. His older sister, Jazz, gives people the impression of being a little too full of herself but she's not a bad kid. When Jazz just disappears without a word no one seems terribly concerned or even interested in what happened to her. It's up to Matt to figure it out while doing anything he can to earn enough to eat and get by.

This is the darker side of '60s culture, the fallout from an unrealistic vision of utopia as a means to an end. Matt is streetwise to a point but he's also just a kid trying to do the best he can while the world around him seems to be losing its collective mind.

At times the disappearance of Jazz is almost like a McGuffin (a plot device used to get a story started). It weaves in and out as the whole thing unravels but the real focus is on Matt. Not knowing exactly what's going on yet seeming to be more grounded in reality than most of the adults who are caught up in their own agendas... And not the least bit hesitant to use Matt to further their own plans.

I would hesitate to call this a thriller. I won't argue the point if someone else does but to me, because of the slow building pace and the way the plot unfolds, it seems more of an atmospheric suspense tale.

This is a good one. Clear your schedule, it may take a chapter or so to get good and absorbed in it, but then you won't be able to put it down. A Thousand Steps was my first book by T. Jefferson Parker, it won't be my last.

*There is adult language, adult situations, and situations involving drug use. Overly sensitive readers might offended.

This one caught my eye right away thanks to the cool cover! A Thousand Steps by T. Jefferson Parker puts us in Southern California in the late 1960s. The story centers around young Matt who sees a dead girl who had gone missing. With that image in his head, he worries about his sister who has suddenly gone missing. With all of his teenage angst swirling around, he needs to find his sister with little help from the police or his pot-smoking mom.

A Thousand Steps is so rich in detail and you feel like you are in Laguna Beach in 1968 as you read it.

Synopsis:

Laguna Beach, California, 1968. The Age of Aquarius is in full swing. Timothy Leary is a rock star. LSD is God. Folks from all over are flocking to Laguna, seeking peace, love, and enlightenment.

Matt Anthony is just trying get by.

Matt is sixteen, broke, and never sure where his next meal is coming from. Mom’s a stoner, his deadbeat dad is a no-show, his brother’s fighting in Nam . . . and his big sister Jazz has just gone missing. The cops figure she’s just another runaway hippie chick, enjoying a summer of love, but Matt doesn’t believe it. Not after another missing girl turns up dead on the beach.

All Matt really wants to do is get his driver’s license and ask out the girl he’s been crushing on since fourth grade, yet it’s up to him to find his sister. But in a town where the cops don’t trust the hippies and the hippies don’t trust the cops, uncovering what’s really happened to Jazz is going to force him to grow up fast.

If it’s not already too late.

Not so much a coming-of-age story as the forced traumatically induced recognition of reality by a naïve teenager. Ploddingly slow at times, this dysfunctional family drama doesn't become intense until near the very end. Centers on the 1960s counter-culture in Orange County, California and a largely ineffective local police department.

A Thousand Steps by T. Jefferson Parker was something very special. It looks deeply at a time when so much was happening.

As in life, not all of the characters are likable, not all of the decisions by adults are smart, kind, or responsible. What is a gift is that our young guy at 16 has the sense he has and is the main one who we root for. His insights into all that is going on in his family, in his community, and in the country are the driving force...and also add on, he is in the midst of a crush of a girl he is interested in. Complicated times.

It's the summer of love in Laguna, CA .. Matt is 16, his older brother is fighting in Nam, his mother has picked up a drug habit, his dad took off 10 years earlier and now his sister is missing.

Much like a sign of the times in which this book takes place, this book has the feel of a kaleidoscope. The story lines weaving in and out of each other circling around the main focal point of Matt trying to find his sister Jazz. You have the blues from the local police force, the pinks and reds from the hippies, the greens and purples from Timothy Leary and his Brotherhood, the blacks from the war, swirling around each other interwinding to create this well written book about sex, drugs and Laguna Beach.

Part crime novel, part coming of age story.. 100% Laguna Beach!

This book takes place in the late 1960s in Laguna Beach California. The main character is a teen age boy from a broken home looking for his kidnapped sister. He has to deal with a mother with addiction issues, a police force that is skeptical that she has been kidnapped,, the local drug/free love culture and a sometimes employer who is involved in the kidnapping. It is a fast paced read and I am looking forward to more from this author.

I received a free Kindle copy of this book courtesy of Net Galley and the publisher with the understanding that I would post a review on Net Galley, Goodreads, Amazon and my nonfiction book review blog. I also posted it to my Facebook page.

Sixteen-year-old Matt Anthony is trying to navigate his way through Southern California in 1968 despite having a stoner mother and an absent father. His older brother is fighting in Vietnam. The book opens with Matt seeing the dead body of a girl who disappeared two months ago. As the police work to cover up her bikini-clad body, people wonder if it was an accident, suicide, or murder. When his sister Jasmine, (Jazz) goes missing, Matt can’t help but feel there might be a connection between the dead girl and his missing sister.

Matt keeps busy with his paper route, pedaling up and down hilly streets, burning calories that he can’t afford to replenish on the meager paper route salary. He does as much fishing as he can to keep his hunger at bay, but he also has a hunger to create art, and those supplies also cost money. But when his sister disappears, after 48 hours he and his mother go to the police to report her missing. The cops are dismissive, assuming she’s a runaway. He knows he can’t count on the cops because all they care about is busting the marijuana-smoking hippies.

It’s painful that so much of what this book describes are still issues we face today. Cops in some states still trouble themselves with something as benign as marijuana use instead of actual crime. In this book, there is LSD, but also far more serious drugs like opiates. That whole pesky opioid crisis hasn’t gone away yet because we keep targeting the users not the big pharma suppliers. I just watched a documentary on NetFlix called Fantastic Fungi, which is also a book, and, like the book How to Change Your Mind by Michael Pollan, they all talk about how psilocybin (magic mushrooms) can help with depression, PTSD, and addiction, but because taking any drugs at all in the 60s was considered to be part of the anti-Vietnam movement, Nixon decided that all drugs were equally terrible for you and began the disastrous War on Drugs. Think how many people could have been helped if scientists could have continued to study these mushrooms and marijuana. How many cops could focus on things far more serious than possession of a stupid joint. How many tax dollars could have been saved if we didn’t spend epic amounts of money incarcerating people who used weed to relax or whatever. It’s infuriating.

Matt’s father, who left six years earlier, has worked as a cop, at least when he can keep a job. He’s a right-wing fanatic who hates all liberals and gay folks. Matt’s mother once just smoked weed but has found her way to opioids. Her job as a waitress wasn’t bringing in big bucks, but missing shifts because of her addiction certainly doesn’t help.

With the help of his long-time crush, Matt decides it’s up to him to find his sister. There is one young female cop who seems to believe him, and so he trusts her, but he’s wary of the other cops, although he’s also not one to hate cops and chant “pig” and other things when they’re in the area.

This book gets faster paced at the end. I really wanted to know if his brother makes it home alive or in a body bag from Nam, and I wanted to know what the heck happened to Jazz. Before that there is a lot of detail about doing his paper route, going door to door looking for Jazz, and going fishing that dragged for me, but the story does put you in that era. Sadly, while the chants and drugs might have altered some, so many other issues seem excruciatingly unchanged.

Matt offers an intriguing perspective on this time in history, and his missing sister is a compelling mystery.
Thanks to NetGalley for the opportunity to review this novel, which RELEASES JANUARY 11, 2022.

(2 1/2). How can you not fall for Matt Anthony? Our 16 year old protagonist has life coming at him from all directions and he does the best he can. Of course, there is a dysfunctional family (aren’t they all?) to keep things spinning. Add in a kidnapped sister, the Vietnam war and SoCal in the 60’s and you have enough ingredients to keep my old brain engaged. Not too much sappiness and certainly enough interesting things going on to keep pages turning. It feels like we have many old stories here being sampled but Parker makes it work pretty well. Pretty good stuff.