This was my first book by Elle Marr. I'm not entirely sure what it was, but I couldn't really get into the book. The writing style was good, but the plot just wasn't doing it for me unfortunately. Also, I kept confusing Fiona and Violet, but that's more of a me problem probably.

The Alone Time
Elle Marr

It is hard to review this horror story without spoilers, but I will definitely try. This book was abhorrent to me and I honestly wish I had never read it. There really was not much a plot and the authoe certainly did not need 300+ pages to tell this badly written story. And that is what she did; she told a story rather than show the story. Showing the story is driven into your head in Creative Writing 101 and never leaves. I felt no connection to the characters and the gruesome details were hard to stomach (so I guess I did have a visceral reaction.) It was a tedious read for me, with some parts just being so unbelievable. I would not recommend this book to anyone to read.

Thank you to NetGalley and Thomas Mercer for the eCopy to review this book.
My thoughts are my own.

Thank you to NetGalley and Thomas & Mercer for the eARC.

If a terrible accident happened, and left you only with your sister, you'd be closest to her right? She is the only you could truly trust right? Elle Marr's book begs the question who can you actually trust? Twisty and untrustworthy characters throughout.

A tense, page-turning story about sisters who survive a suspicious plane crash as children, and learn to rely on one another--for better, or for worse. Elle Marr knows human psychology well, and that was what stood out to me the most while reading THE ALONE TIME. Her portrayal of the Seng family dynamics--father Henry's PTSD and narcissism; mother Janet's indifference and depresssion--and the impact these unresolved issues had on Violet and Fiona rang true. Their longstanding trauma bond, love and loyalty laced with resentment and jealousy, was what created the emotional buy-in for much of what happens in the story. Using time jumps to illustrate the experiences the Seng family has--both at the time their Cessna goes down in the Pacific Northwest, as well as the way Violet and Fiona navigate their grief, anger, notoriety, and feelings of guilt as grown women 25 years later, make for a compelling narrative. At different points in the story, I mistrusted every single character, and the twists and red herrings were executed beautifully. I truly could not put this novel down!

Thank you NetGalley for providing me a free copy in exchange for an honest review.

Alone Time tells a story of two sisters who were stranded in the wilderness after a car accident kills their parents. Twenty-five years later, the women are doing everything they can to leave the trauma they experienced behind. That proves to be more difficult when someone is making a documentary about their time in the wild and claiming the crash wasn't an accident. Which couldn't possibly be the case... right?

I thought the book had major promise as I'm all for survival thrillers, however the plot fell flat for me pretty much immediately. I could not relate to the characters and found the multiple points of view distracting in this particular scenario. I also found some particular plot holes too large to overlook. I am giving the two stars because I thought the survival aspect was actually quite well done.

Everyone is talking about this book. I love how creepy and weird it is. I love the idea of a wilderness so vast that plane can go down and it will take 12 weeks for people to get out there. Does that happen? Madness. I love that.
I think the trauma would cause estrangement so it was fun to see the girls reconnect.
This is a pretty decent weird book.

Thank you Netgalley and Thomas & Mercer for the chance to read The alone time by Elle Marr. The premise of this story sounded interesting and something I could enjoy. Unfortunately, I could never get interested in either the plot or the characters. Pacing was slow, and there were too many errors or inconsistencies. I finally gave up at 40%. This was definitely not for me.

A family's plane crashes into a forest, but only the two young daughters are found alive 11 weeks later. These weeks become known as their "alone time" and now, 25 years later, a documentary threatens to reveal secrets they hoped had remained buried. What truth will emerge? Unfortunately, what emerged was a novel that felt surprisingly messy. Thanks to Thomas & Mercer and NetGalley for providing me with a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

I greatly enjoyed Elle Marr's The Family Bones, about a young woman who joins her family for a weekend away in the hope to learn more about their legacy of psychopathy. While The Family Bones was delightfully over-the-top, I still felt like Marr brought at least some nuance to the discussion of psychopathy. And her characters and their motivations were solid enough that you felt like you knew them and could follow their thinking process. That is what I hoped for with The Alone Time as well but unfortunately I did not get it. The rest of the paragraph will contain *mild spoilers*. Towards the end of the novel, Marr begins playing with ideas of multiple personality disorder and dissociative identity disorder as part of her twist and plot. This was incredibly popular in the early 2000s and 2010s, usually leading to people with mental disorders being vilified. I hoped we had left that behind us and yet I found some of those same instincts in The Alone Time. It also becomes mixed in with ideas of the supernatural, which does not really work and feels forced. There was no need for Marr to take the novel in the direction that she did. While every author is free to write the plot they want, I do also feel an editor or even a sensitivity reader should have flagged how these things might come across to readers.

Fiona and Violet Seng survived a plane crash and 11 weeks alone in the wilderness 25 years ago. Since then, they have stuck to their story and tried to create lives for themselves. Fiona is an artist, using natural elements for her sculptures, while Violet is giving college a third try and working on her sobriety. But with the "anniversary" of their trauma come new revelations in the form of a documentary and the resurfacing of someone who says they know more details. Fiona and Violet reconnect over this after years of no contact in order to present a united front. But there are secrets between the sisters too and so we spent much of The Alone Time looking for someone to trust. The novel is told mostly through Violet and Fiona's perspectives in the present, although we do also get flashbacks to both their parents' perspectives during the crash. Unfortunately the voices of Fiona and Violet were not differentiated enough, which means I did occasionally find myself wondering whose perspective I was currently reading. Aside from that, their characters had all the hallmarks of depth and yet they never felt fully alive to me. I'm not quite sure why, but I think the ending did much to undo any sense I had that I understood these characters.

Like I said above, I did really enjoy Elle Marr's writing in The Family Bones. It was sharp and analytic and never felt overly trite while being delightfully dramatic. I did not find that here in The Alone Time. The metaphors and analogies Marr used in her writing felt clunky, while the connections she crafted between the characters felt flat. The plotting and pacing could have done with another strict editing round, I think. There was a moment in the novel where suddenly a number of weeks had past, which deflated the tension Marr had built so far. Side characters which were suggested as potential romance partners were odd, to say the least, and their introduction added absolutely nothing except for question marks. * The spoiler warning from above is once again active here.* The character of Wes, for example, is absolutely unnecessary. His whole presence in the novel feels odd and when the pay-off comes it was not worth it. Similarly, the role of the documentary maker is oddly forced. I furthermore do not enjoy spending time in a character's head, only to find out they either lied to me or just never gave hints towards the big twist. It makes me feel like I was working for nothing. I'm currently in two minds about whether I'll want to read another Elle Marr novel. I think it will depend on the blurb, but I will go in less enthusiastically than I did with The Alone Time.

The Alone Time was not it for me. The different narrators were hard to keep apart, the pacing was messy, and the ending left me with countless of question marks. This novel could have done with a whole other round of editing.

I cannot imagine dropping from the sky and crashing landing into the middle of nowhere. Especially at a young age. No one around for miles. The mayday not going through with your coordinates. Your mother and father dying on impact. How can a thirteen-year-old Fiona and seven-year-old, Violet survives in the Olympic National Park. Survive they did and now we fast forward twenty-five years later. Fiona is about to have an art installation at a gallery, she knows her life is about to blow up. In the best way possible. Violet has gone back to school for the third time. She has struggled with addiction, since their Alone Time. The twelve weeks they spent in the rainforest trying to survive. They do not discuss it with each other. They just push through, never discussing what happened at the top of that ridge.

When their father's mistress comes forward, making accusations about their family. The girls are left with no choice then to talk to a documentary film maker. Their lives become a never-ending guessing game of what this woman is going to say next, and where she will show up. The book swings between their time in the rainforest and now. There are many twists and turns along the way. I could not read deeply into it, or I was left confused. The marital struggles between their parents, the story they came out of the woods claiming, does not add up. What is true and what is false is half the fun of uncovering what actually occurred during that time. Thank you to Elle Marr, Thomas Mercer, and Over the River Public Relations for my gifted copy.

Thank you Netgalley and Thomas & Mercer for access to this arc.

I felt like this one had potential: dual timelines (which I generally like) follow two sisters, Fiona and Violet Seng. In the earlier timeline, set 25 years ago, the girls and their parents Janet and Henry are flying a small private plane from their home in San Diego to British Columbia. Henry has recently gotten his pilot’s license and borrowed the plane from a friend; the trip is somewhat impromptu and intended to ease tension in the parents’ marriage.

The plane malfunctions and crashes in the Washington wilderness, and Fiona and Violet aren’t rescued for 12 weeks. Henry and Janet do not survive; the specifics of what happens to them – and when – are doled out throughout the book.

There were a lot of aspects of The Alone Time that just weren’t credible even on the surface. The idea that the world would still be intently interested in a sensational case from 25 years before was not realistic. No one would care that Henry Seng had a mistress all those years ago – stories like this move through the public consciousness fast. Further, the sisters fear that the police will reopen an investigation into the case, but whatever they did all those years before, it would seem impossible that the cops would be as suspicious as they appear to be of two women who were 13 and 7 at the time of the crash.

The latter half of the story is taken up with nonsense with the mistress and the documentarian, and dire implications that either Fiona or Violet is a psycho. I didn’t find this hugely compelling, particularly given that Violet, at least, was a little tot at the time and it just seems absurd that she was running around in the wilderness committing vile crimes.

The denouement is silly, with a return to the scene of the crime and various characters acting in ways that make no sense. I stopped caring what happened and who was responsible. I gave this a C.

Elle Marr's 'The Alone Time' is a riveting exploration of family trauma and secrets. Two sisters, Fiona and Violet, survived a wilderness ordeal as children, but the past comes back to haunt them when disturbing details surface. Marr's skillful storytelling and authentic characters keep readers hooked as they unravel the mysteries hidden in the wilderness and within their family. Gripping and emotionally resonant, 'The Alone Time' is a must-read for fans of suspense and family drama.

Just couldn't click with this one. Ending was predictable as well. I normally love Elle Marr so I am surprised that this one didn't mesh with me.

Some research into mental health would be nice. It’s frustrating how many books do so much damage to readers with actual mental illnesses for the fun of a plot.

I went into this one excited about the premise of this book. It was entertaining, and I enjoyed the multiple POVs from the sisters, their mom, and their dad. It helped keep me invested and made me even more curious about what really happened in the woods after the plan crash. Yet, this book fell flat for me. I did enjoy it, but I had a lot of questions. I felt that there were plot holes and very outlandish things that occurred. I had a lot of questions that I had to deduce the answers to. Entertaining, but not fleshed out enough for me.

Thank you NetGalley and Thomas & Mercer for the ARC. All opinions are my own.

25 years and you can't get over tragedy? also, about the 25 years: gofundme did not exist back then so i think the author should have done better research. these sisters desperately needed therapy.

I love Elle Marr. Every time I see she has a new book on the way, I'm clamoring for an early copy. I love the way she crafts her plots, layering on just enough suspense to make them believable, but still twisty enough to keep me frantically flipping pages. The Alone Time is the latest in a string of great mystery/thriller/suspense. I'm already a little sad that I've finished this one, but I'm excited for whatever Elle is working on next!

Thank you to Netgalley and Thomas and Mercer publisher for allowing me the opportunity to read The Alone Time. This was my first time reading a book by this author and I had no expectations of what to expect. This book was about a plane crash that happened over 2 decades ago. Some of the family members and some survived and some were alone hence the title "the Alone Time". I have to honestly say I found this book boring and I will not read another book by this author.

My first Elle Marr book but definitely not my last. I loved the dark and elusive vibe in this story. The characters were great and kept me reading long past my bedtime. Bits of information were doled out, weaving an intricate story great plot twists. Deliciously dark and creepy.
Thank you NetGalley and Elle Marr for the opportunity to read and review this book.

Thank you Netgalley for the ARC of this book. What a ride! I love this author! The storyline about our two sisters is creepy, crazy greatness. It kept me guessing until the end and was refreshingly not predictable. Highly recommend

Fiona and Violet Seng were the only survivors when their family’s Cessna crashed in the Washington wilderness. They were on their own for twelve weeks before they were found. Twenty-five years later, they’re still processing the trauma. Fiona used it in her art as Violet battled addiction and failed relationships. They never spoke about the Alone Time in the wild, but now a documentary is being made. This renews public fascination with them and their version of the events. Details about the family are revealed, and a strange woman claims the crash was deliberate. Fiona and Violet must face the truth of their time in the woods, their parents, and themselves.

The story is told from different points of view, primarily from Fiona and Violet. Fiona is the oldest, a teenager when the plane went down, and always said she'd protect Violet, who was seven at the time. There was always attention on the sisters due to the sensational nature of their survival, which was largely repressed. Daley is the most persistent of the documentary makers, and Violet thought getting their own version of the story would help to stop the growing talk about her family, specifically her father. As the book continues, we see flashes of the accident and the immediate aftermath of the crash. We start getting a picture of life in the Seng family before the crash, and why there were so many secrets in the woods.

The twists along the way were completely compelling. The story we thought we had figured out changed as new details emerged. The parents were broken, fractured people trying desperately to save their marriage in the face of their untreated issues. The children aren't aware of the extent of it, but the reader is. The final pages are especially twisted and really bring home how trauma can affect and change people.