"A bride-to-be's discovery of long-lost wedding rings at an estate sale reveals the key to a decades-old cold case in a small-town mystery perfect for fans of Louise Penny.

2024. Recently-engaged city girl Cora is new to the small town of Hickory Falls. Still adjusting to the change in pace, she's delighted when she stumbles upon a quaint estate sale. Drawn in by the knickknacks, she buys a jar of colorful baubles and is surprised to find two rings at the bottom of the jar. When she innocently sets out to find the original owner of the rings, she instead stumbles upon a decades-old mystery.

1953. Clarity Grey should've known better than to get involved with a married man, but their connection went too deep to ignore. When he divorces his wife for her, they marry, and she gets the family life she's always dreamed of, with a new stepdaughter and a child of her own. But just as suddenly, her new life slips out of her hands when she simply vanishes, never to be seen or heard of again.

Clarity is labeled as flakey and a homewrecker, so nobody in town takes her disappearance seriously - until Cora, seventy years later.

Told in dual timelines, this engrossing novel exposes one family's secrets and the twisted lies that are hidden in small towns."

Jumble sales to the rescue of cold cases!

Told in dual timelines, Pretty Dead Things is the story of Cora, newly engaged and transplanted to a very small town where everyone knows your secrets and Clarity, a free spirited artist living in the same small town who falls in love with someone she shouldn't have and had mysteriously disappeared decades earlier. When Cora buys a jar full of nicknacks at an estate sale, their lives are thrown together.
I really enjoyed reading about both these women and got sucked into the mystery immediately. Good writing and good main characters. Definitely worth a read!

I didn't enjoy this as much as I hoped I would. It took longer than it should've for the story to grip me and even then, it was hard to care about the mystery at times because I found the fmc, Cora, a bit annoying. There just wasn't anything to her?? She had no depth and that made it difficult to connect with her. The romance between Cora and her fiancé wasn't a focus in the story and that didn't bother me, but what did was the fact that they had no chemistry. They barely seemed to care about one another to the extent one would expect an engaged couple to; especially since she moved across the country for him. I couldn't even get into the whole small town setting because she didn't seem to like it there at all.

I'm glad this was told in dual timelines because there wasn't much of anything occurring in the present. All the drama and action occurred in the past and the only thing Cora "added", if you can even say she added anything, was the fact that she found the rings and got the ball rolling on this 60 year old mystery being solved (which wasn't very difficult to solve by the way).

There's cheating in this story (not between Cora and her fiancé, but in the past) so I don't recommend it if that's something you hate. While I didn't care one way or the other, I didn't like how the author tried to make us sympathize with Lewis, the husband. He recognized what he was doing was wrong because he apparently "takes his vows very seriously" yet he...still cheated? I guess we were supposed to hate his first wife and support his actions because she drove him to that point with her nagging and over-the-top expectations. And of course given the time period this was happening during, only the other woman was shamed.

This also had a lot of filler for a book that isn't even 300 pages long but the writing was okay overall.

Thank you NetGalley and Crooked Lane Books for this arc!

This was an emotional read with a years old mystery. A small town atmosphere and dual timelines kept me turning the pages. However, it did take a bit to really pull me in and engage me. I'm not sure if it was the writing style or the story itself. I do enjoy slow-paced reads as long as there is something to really intrigue me, and I think the protagonist's inner dialogue and personality are what I struggled with at times. She needed a bit more to her. The conclusion was the best part and what really made the book for me. Altogether, this was okay, nothing mind-blowing but still an enjoyable read for a relaxing day. Three Stars.

Thank you, Netgalley and Crooked Lane Books, for this ARC.

I struggled with this, unfortunately, I found the writing clunky in places and the story did not really grab me. It's a shame as the premise was really good but it wasn't for me, Hopefully others enjoy it and thanks for sending me a copy to review.

A decent mystery but nothing really outstanding. I liked the alternating perspectives between time periods as the reader finds out what was actually happening behind the clues but I couldn't really connect with any of the characters and felt that the main character herself was very bland. For someone who is engaged, she certainly didn't spend much time with her fiancé.

A decent, slow-burn mystery, to pick up if you need a relaxing read but nothing I'd go out of my way for.

Cora has recently moved to small-town Hickory Falls because her fiance has joined the family's dental practice. When she buys a glass full of baubles at an estate sale she finds two old wedding rings. She tries to return them to the family and a short time later she is involved in a 60-year-old cold case of a women who disappeared without a trace.
I really enjoyed reading this book. The book is well written, Cora's character was completely relatable and the mystery kept me guessing until the very end. The book is told mostly from Cora's POV but there are several chapters that tell the story from 60plus years ago.
Really an enjoyable mystery.

2024: Cora finds a wedding ring set in a jar of baubles she purchased at an estate sale and in trying to return them she digs up long buried town secrets.
Set in the small town of Hickory Falls, Cora had moved there with her fiance Elliot so he could start working as a partner at his father’s dental practice.

Late 40s/early 50s: Clarity gets involved with a married man who divorces his current wife to marry her. Not too long after she suddenly disappears and everyone, assuming that she is a flaky, homewrecker, refuses to take it seriously.

Pros:
* Dual timelines
* Small-town mystery
* Cora and Clarity are very likeable characters. They were both similar in so many ways but also very different.
* The mystery of what happened to Clarity was interesting and kept me guessing right up to the reveal
* It was a lot like an episode of Cold Case in so many ways, and the ending was sad in the way that so many of the series episode endings are.

Cons:
* Cora and Elliot’s relationship made no sense. They appeared to have nothing in common and it was difficult to see why they were together at all.
* I also did not enjoy all the wedding stuff and the whole “poor girl marrying in to rich important family in small town” storyline.

Overall this was a solid murder mystery and contained a lot of things that I really enjoy.

This was a fast read and very well paced and it kept you guessing until the very end. The story went from 2024 to 1953 exploring the secrets small towns keep from outsiders and what is hidden beneath the surface if you just start looking. The mystery was really great and I really enjoyed the Midwest small town in this story. This is a perfect blend of suspense and mystery and I really enjoyed the family aspect of this and the dynamic between the 3 sisters.
Thanks to Crooked Lane Books and Netgalley for the complimentary copy of this book. All opinions in this review are my own.

Do you love books with a dual timeline? Do you like a good mystery? Do you like small towns in the Midwest? You might like this book. New in town Cora gets lost and ends up at an estate sale and purchases a jar or miscellaneous baubles in which she finds an engagement and wedding ring. Trying to find the rightful owners she is thrown into the mystery of a woman who disappeared without a trace. If you know small towns you know how gossip spreads. Did the rings owner really just run off or was it something more sinister?

Thank you Netgalley and publisher for the e-arc!

Thanks to Crooked Lane Books and NetGalley for the ARC. If you want a change of pace and just want to read a very good family mystery, then this is for you. Good writing.

"Pretty Dead Things* by Lilian West is a captivating read that blends mystery and suspense perfectly. The story follows an engaged city girl who, after moving to a small town, stumbles upon an estate sale and discovers some intriguing jewelry. Her curiosity about the original owner of the rings sets off a thrilling unraveling of secrets. The suspense keeps you hooked from start to finish, and the book’s length is just right—making it a perfect weekend read."

I was drawn to the cover illustration and the description of Pretty Dead Things: a young woman discovers long-lost wedding rings in a jar full of marbles, buttons, and costume jewelry that she purchased at an estate sale. Jars like that are the first things I look at in thrift and junk stores, and even though I've never come across anything especially valuable, I still like that feeling of undiscovered treasure, even if it turns out to be a beautiful blue marble or a special cut glass button. Cora wants to do the right thing and return the rings to the family that they belonged to, so this creates a cozy mystery as she sets out to find who this might be. This mystery is pursued in dual timelines, and I personally enjoyed the 1940s timeline more than the present-day one. The characters were a bit more interesting, and I found Cora bland and naive in the present day. I do wonder why she was getting married as she didn't have any interest in planning even a simple wedding, and her fiancé seemed unhappy with almost all of the choices she was making towards returning the rings.

Thank you to Crooked Lane Books and NetGalley for providing me with a copy of this book. It will be published on December 10, 2024.

When Clarity Grey disappeared, no one seem to really care. People in her small town didn’t considered her worth worrying over. It wasn’t until 70 years later that Cora discovers something add an estate sale that sent her on a mission that leads to Clarity, literally I’m figuratively.

70 years later, will Clarity’s story and the reason for her disappearance finally come to light? No matter what people in small towns may think, everyone and their story is worthy.

I found this to be a good read, and I enjoyed the story. Though it could have been a little more cohesive, and that would have made it a great read. I still recommend reading it as the concept and premise itself is solid.

This book was gripping and hard to put down. It didn't feel like everything else you see out there, it felt very fresh. I really enjoyed this book!

I had some problems with Lilian West’s novel, Pretty Dead Things. However, I love the cover.

“Small towns bury their secrets deep and don’t look kindly on people digging for them.” Cora learns that quickly when she buys a jar of buttons and baubles at an estate sale and finds an engagement ring and a wedding ring amongst the colorful trinkets.

She’s from California, and she’s bored in the small town of Hickory Falls somewhere in the Midwest. She moved there to be with her fiance, Elliott, a local dentist from a long line of doctors and dentists in town. She should be preparing for her upcoming wedding. Instead, Cora digs into the story behind the rings and finds herself upsetting women in a prominent family and even her future mother-in-law.

The mystery goes back to the early 1950s, but no one dug into it until Cora starts looking in 2024. Clarity Grey married a man in town, but she disappeared from her front yard when her daughter was six. Although Clarity’s husband swore she was abducted, there was never a trace of the woman. But, her husband, Lewis Shaw, left behind three daughters to wonder about the truth. And, Cora has enough time on her hands to talk with the women and research reports of Clarity’s disappearance.

Oh, there’s so much that bothers me about this story. It’s vague and repetitive. Vague – Cora doesn’t have a last name. Hickory Falls is somewhere in the Midwest. Midwest? First, that’s a large area to cover. And, even the 2024 timeline seems set sometime in the distant past, possibly in the South with its whispers of women who live n the woods who “dabble in things good Christians don’t speak of.” I’m not crazy about dual timelines, but the vagueness of the setting and the book itself bothers me more. And, it’s repetitive and slow.as Cora hears similar stories from a number of people.

As I said, I love the cover of Pretty Dead Things. But, there were too many issues with the story for me to enjoy the book.

I confess that I did not finish this book, because we did not mesh well at all - there is a certain opressive atmosphere of the creepy "is something actually wrong or is this just small town things" kind that is very well crafted, but the overall book feels more like a romcom, which was unexpected and not something I enjoy. Points for good ambientation and a good starting point, wish the original marketing was more in the line of "romance with creepy mistery elements" instead of just "sorta creepy mistery".

Thank you to NetGalley and Crooked Lane Books for this early copy!

This was such an interesting premise; a cozy mystery but somehow so much more than the light-hearted cozies I've enjoyed in the past. I've always adored the show Cold Case and this definitely gave me the same vibes with an old clue coming to light and a story that needs to be told.

I loved the small-town Midwest setting, it felt like it could be in my own town and the story from the past. I thought the author did a great job setting up the story slowly and giving us small glimpses of the suspects before the big reveal. However, the present day story of Cora was far less compelling and I found myself wishing it would get back to the flashbacks in the past, which is what kept this book at just 3.5 stars, rounded up to 4.

I would definitely read any follow-up books by this author and recommend picking this up if you enjoy cozy mysteries but darker vibes!

Usually i don't read books with to much mysteries but this one captived me from the first page. The worldbuilding was very important in creating the suspance and mistery and each chapter promised me a good read.

Thank you NetGalley and publisher for this arc!

What a great book! The author did great at describing everything that it made me feel like I was there watching first had. What a cozy read!!