I think shorter would have been better, I couldn't get past a lot of without getting bored. Also, the Kindle version is really expensive.

This book just about broke my heart. Anything to do with children being harmed is a tough subject of course. This book sent it to another level. The creepy atmosphere of small towns, winter storms and missing kids was riveting. The middle dragged a bit with the adults in the story going through emotional struggles. In the end I am so glad I read this . The story, while heart wrenching, was well told. The characters were very well developed throughout.

Thanks to NetGalley and Anansi Press for the ARC. I wanted to love this book. I really did and at one point I thought I might. BUT... the writing was just too much for me. Too wordy and rambling. I could not finish. I think the story would have been a good one but I never go there.

In the summer of 1979, a young boy named Michael disappeared in the woods while he and his friend Marnie were sheltering from a storm. At first Marnie receives comfort and sympathy, but as she tells her story of what happened, she falls under suspicion and is ostracized. Thirty years later, a young girl disappears after school in a nearby town. Her father Bill spirals into despair, haunted by the traumatic experience of losing his daughter and the suspicions of the detectives. And then when a third child goes missing, both Marnie and Bill find themselves the prime suspects and are forced to relive their past traumas.

This book just didn’t work for me. It’s a dual POV, told from Marnie’s experience in the past and present, and told from Bill’s experience in the present. The two stories don’t come together until the end of the book and even then it’s just a brief convergence. This makes the swaps in POVs feel disjointed – I kept waiting for some reason why these two stories were put together to appear, but it never really did. The characters were bland and lacked anything that made them emotionally relatable or engaging.

The writing style was not enjoyable or conducive to telling an immersive or atmospheric story. It was often more stream-of-consciousness stylistically and quite dry; there would be a sentence or two of action then paragraphs and pages of rambling remembrances or thoughts on something mostly unrelated to what was currently happening. This work was not atmospheric at all because the author constantly told the reader everything rather than showing. There were many instances where I could have skipped between three and ten pages and not have missed anything of substance. Unfortunately, none of this exposition added to the character depth or development either nor did it aid in creating emotionally compelling characters. There were no transitions between the POVs, and as the characters lacked unique voices, I had to just keep reading and wait for context clues to figure out who the narrator was.

I hate to be harsh, but there was no plot to this book and honestly it felt like there was no real point in reading it. It was neither a mystery nor a thriller. I think it was supposed to be an examination of how trauma and grief can affect people differently even thirty years down the line, but it was poorly executed with detached and flat characters. The tone of the exposition was completely flat as well, which made none of the exploration of emotions feel meaningful or emotional in the slightest. It could be because this is a translation of the original work, but as it is, I can’t recommend this book at all. My thanks to NetGalley and House of Anansi Press for allowing me to read this work. All thoughts and opinions expressed in this review are my own.

Trembling River by Andrée A. Michaud, translated by J. C. Sutcliffe is a highly recommended mystery and explores the heartbreaking disappearance of three children.

In August 1979 twelve-year-old Michael disappears in the woods of Trembling River while with his friend Marnie Duchamp. A search only came up with a muddy sneaker. The disappearance of her friend has haunted Marnie ever since it happened. Thirty years later Billie Richards never makes it to her dance class and disappears just before her ninth birthday. Her father Bill, a children's book author, is devastated and falls into a deep inconsolable state of grief and mourning. Neither knows that another child will disappear from the village of Trembling River.

The writing is exquisite and captures the anguish, mourning, guilt, and even anger while Marnie and Bill attempt to somehow comprehend their loss. Marnie constantly questions what she could have done to prevent Michael's disappearance. Bill is despondent and struggles with his mental health. Understandably, he is heartbroken and can't comprehend a life without his beloved daughter.

The structure of the novel is divided into three parts but these parts are written with no chapters. The narrative switches between viewpoints and readers are expected to follow who is speaking. This can be a bit off-putting, especially in the second part when the novel delves into lengthy and very emotional interior monologues from Marnie and Bill. I'm not a fan of protracted stream-of-consciousness passages, so this was a bit of a struggle to get through, although it is highly distressed and heartbreaking. Then, when tragedy strikes again and another child disappears, the mystery and heartbreak deepens.
Disclosure: My review copy was courtesy of House of Anansi Press via NetGalley.
The review will be published on Barnes & Noble, Google Books, Edelweiss, and Amazon.

Overall, I’m glad I read this book. The structure is quite interesting, shifting between the two main characters’ viewpoints and sometimes third person narration. This book is divided into three parts, but there were no chapters. I found this difficult to keep up with sometimes as I was getting a hang of the multiple perspectives and it made finding a good stopping point more difficult.
Trembling River is a fascinating character driven story that deeply delves into the psyches of two people who have had a loved one go missing as a child. Bill’s daughter Billie disappeared after school several years ago, and in 1979 Marnie was the last person to see her best friend Michael alive. This book doesn’t shy away from the dark thoughts that plague them and the suspicion and cruel treatment given to people close to a disappearance. There was a point in part two that was a bit of a slog to get through as it was just stream of consciousness passages from Bill and Marnie. Thankfully, then it picked up and I was interested enough to plow through to the end.

4 stars

Wow what an amazing book. Emotions aplenty. The characters were so well written and relatable. The story is so engrossing and just plain flat out good. I highly recommend and can’t wait to get my hands on another by this author.

Thank you to House of Anansi Press Inc for the opportunity to read this arc. It is available to buy Feb 7,2023.

Holy tears, Batman. Oh this book made me cry. As a mother this book has laid out my worst fears. The sudden inexplicable disappearance of your child. Mr. Michaud wrote a parents guilt, anger, and mourning with such eloquence and emotion. Children are disappearing in the small villages surrounding a lake and no one knows why. The writer brings you through rough shod of the emotions parents go through when their children are taken and there is no trace. It made my stomach twist in knots reading it. I highly as highly recommend this book.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for an early copy of Trembling River. This book was published in French in 2018, and the English translation will be available on February 7, 2023. Since moving to Montreal, I have been trying to catch up with Quebec thrillers translated into English and was very pleased to receive the ARC.

The author Andree A Michaud is one of the most celebrated writers in the French language, and her books have won numerous literary prizes. She has twice won the Governor General's Award, the Arthur Ellis Award for Excellence in Canadian Crime Writing, and a prize in France, and has been nominated for other prizes. The English translator has also been acclaimed.

This character-driven, emotionally intense, and highly atmospheric story plunges the reader into the chilling Quebec winter. The snow-laden trees, the forest with snowbanks, ice, and mud, and the frozen ground crunching underfoot are vividly described. The children are well-written and age-appropriate.

Trembling River centres on the tragic disappearance of three children. One, a twelve-year-old boy, vanished while playing in the woods in 1979. He was with his best friend, Melanie Duchamp. Thirty years later, Billie Richard vanished just before her 9th birthday. Her father Bill is shattered by anguish and grief. He is a writer of popular children's books featuring talking animals that he and Billie enjoyed. The now-adult Melanie has never forgotten her friend Michael and still worries if she could have done anything to prevent what happened to him. Before he vanished, he seemed to go into a trance-like state, and she thinks he uttered nonsense, but the noise of an approaching storm garbled his sentence. The story is straightforward up to the point where Bill begins a heart-aching struggle affecting his mental health. No trace of either child was found, and the bodies were never recovered. There has been no closure for Melanie or Bill who are living with anguish, guilt and sorrow.

We now get lengthy, highly emotional streams of consciousness from the two adult's perspectives. Their inner thoughts are meandering and go off on unexpected tangents of gloom and melancholy. These passages became an emotional overload leaving me numb. Bill wonders what he could have done to protect Billie. He thinks a hovering parent would cause his daughter to become frightened and depressed and that she would rebel by becoming delinquent. He imagines the horrible things the predator may have done to her. Then he switches his mind to imagining she is frolicking with his talking animals from the stories they both loved or her spirit is visiting parts of the galaxy. He thinks he receives her messages in the songs of birds. Both unhappy adults remove themselves from society.

Now another boy, also named Mike, has disappeared. The police and residents regard Bill and Melanie as prime suspects in the case of the new missing child. They have become pariahs. As one person remarks, they are the present Paul Bernardo and Karla Homolka. They receive threats and are in danger of going outside. Both are aggressively questioned at their homes and the police station, and it is clear they are not believed. If they are absolved of the murder of the third child, Bill dreams of getting as far away as Australia.
The book was not my style, but I believe it will appeal to the majority of readers.