Unfortunately I was unable to download this book before the archive date, so I'm not able to leave a review. I look forward to reading and reviewing books by this author in the future.

This book is wild! Every year, a small town in Arkansas hosts an elaborate egg hunt. It would be some standard smalltown fun except a serial killer uses the event to hunt for prey. According to some--others insist the string of mysterious deaths can be explained away as accidental. I don't really know how to describe this book. "The Lottery" meets "Fried Green Tomatoes"? It was a lot of fun and I'll be looking for more by the author, who was new to me.

"Peek between the cracks, and you might see some truth. But don’t linger too long, for the Hunter is on the loose."

There is an annual hunt for a golden egg - just before Easter. Tied to it is a large amount of money - and many in the town go after the hunt to win the prize. But there seems to be a strange amount of death around the event as well, and people are starting to wonder if one hunter, out there, isn't hunting the egg but the hunters themselves.

I enjoyed this one as an audiobook. I was drawn in almost immediately - I loved the "shared google doc" updates giving us information about the previous deaths along with the 2 POV. I liked the adventure of the story, the mystery of what was really happening, and trying to figure out who was friend and who I didn't think was. It was a quick read and I enjoyed the mystery!

A huge thank you to the author and publisher for providing an e-ARC via Netgalley. This does not affect my opinion regarding the book.

This book will join my list of titles where the blurb promised much but the content didn’t deliver. The writing felt awkward, and the plot was dull, making it a struggle to get through. Although the book’s format seemed intriguing at first, it ultimately fell short.

This was an interesting read! I read the synopsis but it was different than I was expecting. The author masterfully creates themes of survival into a fast-paced narrative that keeps you on edge from start to finish. The characters were well developed and twists were unexpected. If you love suspenseful, character-driven mysteries, go ahead and snag this book!

Nobody does it better than Kelly J. Ford. Another amazing book that peels back the shades to show us these small southern towns and all their goods and ills.

Unique structure! I enjoyed how it alternated between the storytelling and the shared docs, social media, etc. Unfortunately, the storytellng itself was weak. The author makes a point to tell you the race of every single character introduced no matter how incidental they are, which is incredibly distracting (and I am all about representation).

This book had a lot of potential but did not do it for me. The writing was not the best, and at times confusing. Really interesting concept and even cooler if actually based on true events though.

Love this book. Incredible writing and plot. Really sucked me right in. I can't wait to read more by Kelly Ford!

Every year, a local Arkansas radio station holds a hunt for the Golden Egg at Eastertime, Despite the fact that people involved with the hunt mysteriously die, one a year. Nell's brother was the first victim, and this year is the hardest yet for Nell, and now she's determined to figure out what happened to Garrett., and if the Hunter really exists.

This book was really interesting--it explores a lot of interfamilial relationships after someone in the family dies at a young age unexpectedly. Nell blames herself for Garrett's death, and feels like everyone around her does, as well, living with the guilt for 17 years. It also talks about loss in relation to the rest of the purported victims, all of whom die either accidentally (falling out of a tree and getting hoodie strings tangled on the way down, choking on a granola bar) or intentionally by their own hands. How easy it is to attribute those deaths to an outside force that may or may not exist. Is there really a serial killer haunting Pressly, Arkansas, or are Eggheads just a supremely unlucky bunch to the tune of one death a year?
It makes you think, is the money worth all of the deaths? Or would most of them happen anyway, so might as well keep having the hunt that is one of the few tourist draws this small town has?

I enjoyed the book a lot. It's fast paced and keeps you turning pages, because you need to know what is going to happen next to Nell, Ada, and Elijah. There are some great twists, and I can't wait to read more from Ford.

The Hunt is a well-done, gripping atmospheric mystery about a potential serial killer in small-town Alabama. It hooked me immediately, and I couldn't put it down until I finished it! The ending of the book definitely confused me, but for the sake of avoiding spoilers, I won't say any more. I thoroughly enjoyed the two perspectives we get throughout the novel, and I found all of our main characters to be nicely developed. I wouldn't call this a jaw-dropping thriller with loads of shock value, so those looking for a read similar to Verity or Gone Girl should look elsewhere, but this is a wonderfully done, atmospheric suspense that I'll definitely be recommending widely.

The Hunt by Kelly J Ford is an absolutely gripping book! This book has me hooked from the absolute beginning, constantly wanting more, more, more! Binged this and I have no regrets!!!

I really wanted to get to this one, as it seemed interesting. This was requested when I first found out about NetGalley and I had requested so many ARCs that I could not get to all of them before they were archived. If I can find this somewhere for a reasonable price, I will try to get it!

An overall decent story, with an atmospheric setting and interesting characters. The pacing didn't work great for me, and there were a couple of things quickly wrapped at the end that I'd hoped would be more deeply explored, but I think it was solid as a whole.

This had the potential to be really engrossing: A radio show host runs a contest every year where a contestant must find a carefully hidden golden egg somewhere around town or its surrounding countryside. There are eager individual participants and teams each year, but there are also deaths each year, seemingly due to natural causes or freak accidents. The death that set off the conspiracy and true-crime obsessed is of a seventeen-year-old boy, Garrett. He, his younger sister (and main character) Nell Holcomb, and his girlfriend Tessa were all hunting for the egg when he died. Nell and Tessa were irreparably emotionally scarred by his death, to the extent that Tessa left Nell to raise Garrett's son Elijah. Nell drowned herself in alcohol and gambling, and it was only because she had to raise Elijah that she cleaned up and got steady work at a plastic lid manufacturing plant.

Years later, Nell hates any mention of the Golden Egg hunt, while her "work wife" Ada Johnson is an avid hunter each year, hoping desperately to win to get the cash payout. Both their kids are friends, and Ada used to hunt with her son, but this year surreptitiously invited Elijah to be her teammate. Ada knows this will piss off Nell, even while she deals with her own confused feelings for the other woman.

Author Kelly J. Ford tells this story through Nell's and Ada's perspectives. The characters are well fleshed out,; they're complicated people, and alternately sympathetic and frustrating. Ford also includes documented histories of all the people who have died during each year's Hunt, radio commercial transcripts, social media posts and news articles. This lends the story a feeling of authenticity, even though this is fiction.

Interestingly, this novel is based on actual events in Arkansas, and Ford builds a terrific atmosphere in her interpretation of the situation. The mystery surrounding the Golden Egg Hunt, however, lacked, as I don't think there were sufficient clues to lead the reader to a satisfying resolution. Also, I felt this was more of a family drama than a crime novel, so I never really felt gripped by the narrative in the way I was expecting for a thriller.

Thank you to Netgalley and to Thomas & Mercer for this ARC in exchange for my review.

A seemingly pointless story….a dumb Easter egg hunt that yearly seems to cause a death….no real suspect….and a very non satisfactory conclusion . I skimmed a lot.

Thanks for the ARC! The story provides a fresh take on the serial killer genre. Someone is preying on a small town and killing after the annual Easter egg hunt.

I love how this book portrays a small rural town accurately. The book summary lays out the primary storyline of the annual hunt that is orchestrated by a local radio station. The station offers clues and the “Eggheads” search for small prizes and the winner receives the ultimate prize: $50,000 from the radio station. Most of the chapters are written as if writing a research paper, with the thoughts of the citizens: a) those that think the deaths are accidental and unrelated, b) those that think the Hunt is cursed, and c) those that think there is something more sinister. The drafts also outline the number of deaths, modes and methods of the deaths and select details of the victims associated around the time of the Hunt. I thought the concept of the book was unique and it started with great potential, but the ending was a bit of a letdown for me personally.

What the hell did I just read? The story was ok at first, full of holes but a little fun, and then the author just gave up at the end. Really none of the ending made any sense, not even when they tried to explain everything away.

I had trouble getting into this book. Then had more trouble finishing it. I hate to say it but, I would go 2-3 days not wanting to pick it up. None of the characters clicked in any way for me. Didn't hate them, but didn't like them either. I was very disappointed in how it ended.
Thank you NetGalley Kelly J. Ford and Thomas & Mercer for an ARC of this title.
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