Based on the reviews for this book, I’ve noticed most people’s opinions fall into two categories - they either loved it or hated it. Not much in between. I am in the loved it category. This book grabbed my attention to the point where I could not put it down! I was hooked all the way though. I did knock a star off due to the fact that this story is too closely related to an actual, current event. Felt a bit icky and too soon to be using a current case as a storyline.

Thanks Sourcebooks Landmark and Netgalley for the ARC.

Okay so I guess I know what book I am buying this week because yes! I am loving the critique of the true crime community, the exploration of grief, the use of online forms, and the corrupt police force. I think the serial killers and crimes were a little predictable (Barbie killer?) but I also understand it. Men and other women hate beautiful successful women, and they want them gone.

Overall, this is a pretty decent thriller and I will be adding a shelf trophy to my collection.

“I suspect I was born to fall into rabbit holes.”

Ashley Winstead once described herself as a mood writer and it’s my favorite way to describe her—especially since everything she writes is gold.

This Book Will Bury Me is no exception—utterly captivating from the very first page, I was mesmerized by Ashley’s ability to not only capture the impact of amateur sleuths on true crime cases, but also the behind-the-scenes elements of what drives people to want to solve cases from their couch.

At the heart of this story is grief, community, a search for answers, and a desire to belong. It’s about love, loss, and finding our purpose in life. It’s about giving back when we’re no longer sure what we have to offer.

“Sometimes the joy of being human lies in the things we cannot describe.”

I love how Ashley portrayed this story. Sharing the events that transpired a year ago, a fictional portrayal woven with very real cases, with regular breaks of the fourth wall as Jane Sharp shares her hindsight with her readers. A book within a book, a multitude of stories, and the coming together and falling apart of many lives.

“It’s what we will never know about the ones we love that binds us to them.”

In a time where so many of us form relationships online, it felt particularly striking how at the very heart of this book is just how much we can trust those online. How much can we trust them to solve a crime? How much can we trust them to take care of us? How much can we trust them to not steer us wrong?

I have recommended this book to countless people and I will likely never stop. Written in such a unique manner, I cannot get over Ashley’s ability to morph her writing style into whatever her story needs in order to thrive.

Make sure to pick this one up if you enjoy:
- True crime
- Online communities
- Found family
- Unique and unputdownable thriller
- Serial killer stories
- Epistolary story

I was not a huge fan of this one- I think it mirrored real life a little too closely and felt a little more true crime than I tend to prefer my books.

Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for a readers copy of this title. My reviews never contain spoilers and are freely given.

Told from the perspective of a female member of a five person team of online true crime sleuths, this book examines multiple issues, i.e., grief and loss, trust, obsessive attachment to the investigation.
While investigating multiple murders, our protagonist is also trying to deal with the sudden death of her father. Both investigations lead her to surprising discoveries about her subjects and ultimately about herself.

This Book Will Bury Me by Ashley Winstead is a thriller about five amateur sleuths that come together to solve the murders of three college girls. The mystery just gets stranger and stranger as they learn more about what happened. And they keep getting pulled into the drama. This book is very much like a true crime thriller, and it is actually loosely based on real world events. I really enjoyed the writing style and the mystery, and I'll definitely be reading more of Winstead's books in the future. Thanks to NetGalley for the free digital review copy. All opinions are my own.

For true crime lovers, the obsession gets REAL! Jane Sharp finds like minded amateur sleuths through the internet and gains notoriety when they all solve a big case close to her hometown. She’s hooked. This motley crew understands her better than anyone ever has. When things start to get a little too close to home, she realizes they may not all be who they say they are. I have enjoyed Ashley Winstead but this one took a while to get into.

This book lives up to its hype! A fictional memoir about someone who helped solve a serial killer case in Idaho, with lots of twists and turns. Absolutely loved it and highly recommend.

After the unexpected death of her father, Jane distracts herself with an obsession with true crime and an online community of amateur sleuths. After a massacre on a college campus, Jane and her group investigate the case to try and catch the killer.

I enjoyed the format of this one, written as a tell-all book from Jane's perspective a year after the conclusion of the case. I liked seeing the chat threads from the online community and watching the group try to piece together the puzzle of the crime. It accurately portrays how sometimes internet sleuths find things detectives may have missed, but also get things wrong and can hurt innocent people in the process.

Overall the story was a little long and I predicted the end, but the pace and characters kept me engaged.

This Book Will Bury Me is definitely a polarizing one. I really got into the storyline of websleuths who try to solve a grisly crime themselves. But the parallels to a real-life case (the murders of four students at a university in Idaho) felt a little gross and opportunistic at the same time.

Ashley Winstead is one of those authors I’ll always read, and *The Book Will Bury Me* was no exception. While it didn’t quite hit the same high for me as 'In My Dreams I Hold a Knife' or 'Midnight is the Darkest Hour', I still found myself pulled in right away.
This one leans into the true crime/online sleuthing world, and I thought that angle was super engaging—especially since I personally don’t spend much time on Reddit, so it all felt wild and fascinating in a slightly terrifying way 😂. Winstead’s writing is as sharp as ever, and I loved how quickly the story grabbed me (despite other reviews mentioning a slow start—I didn’t feel that at all!).

What kept it from being a 5-star for me was that I guessed the killer fairly early on, and while that didn’t totally ruin the story, it did take away from the suspense a bit. Also, the way one real-life case clearly influenced parts of the plot felt a little tricky for me, mostly because that case is still so unresolved. That said, this was still a really solid read—dark, addictive, and full of that creeping dread Winstead does so well. If you’re into true crime, murder mysteries, or internet rabbit holes, definitely add this to your TBR.

Review of This Book Will Bury Me by Ashley Winstead

OK, I think I found a new favorite Ashleigh Winstead book. I did read the synopsis of this one before I started it, and I knew before I started it that I was going to absolutely love it. I loved the true crime angle. I liked the loose basis of a real life crime that the story was built around. I loved Everything about it really I listened and read at the same time and binged it in less than the day I would say this felt slightly different than her other books, but as I said, probably my favorite by her. If you like this author, if you’d like true crime, or if you just like to read a good thrilling book this one’s for you.

Synopsis:
After the unexpected death of her father, college student Jane Sharp longs for a distraction from her grief. She becomes obsessed with true crime, befriending armchair detectives who teach her how to hunt killers from afar. In this morbid internet underground, Jane finds friendship, purpose, and even glory...
So when news of the shocking deaths of three college girls in Delphine, Idaho takes the world by storm, and sleuths everywhere race to solve the crimes, Jane and her friends are determined to beat them. But the case turns out to be stranger than anyone expected. Details don't add up, the police are cagey, and there seems to be more media hype and internet theorizing than actual evidence. When Jane and her sleuths take a step closer, they find that every answer only begs more questions, and begin to suspect their killer may be smarter and more prolific than any they've faced before. Placing themselves in the center of the story starts to feel more and more like walking into a trap...
Told one year after the astounding events that concluded the case and left the world reeling, when Jane has finally decided to break her silence about what really happened, she tells the true story of the Delphine Massacres. And what she has to confess will shock even the most seasoned true

When Jane's father dies, she leaves college and goes home to live with her mother. As she muddles through the grief, she befriends a group of online detectives, and learns to hunt killers from afar. But when three college women are killed in Idaho, Jane and her friends are determined to figure out what happened. I really enjoyed this book from a character perspective--Jane was easy to understand and empathize with. A lot of the book online conversation, which at times felt a little tedious. I still enjoyed it though and am looking forward to the author's next book!

I strongly believe this author is good at shocking the readers and was excited for this one just with the summary. As someone not too knowledgeable about Idaho murders, it definitely pique my curiosity and it had a lot of twists and turns. Investigation by internet sleuth is so on point and there is no dearth of that in our current world. When Jane decides to bury herself into this investigation to grieve in her own way, she has no idea what she was getting into. About how it is based on real incidents can be icky for some but I felt there will be books about it for sure so it is what it is.

I usually enjoy Ashley Winstead's books, but I couldn't get interested in this one no matter how many times I picked it up. There were so many characters that I couldn't keep up with who they were, and honestly, I just didn't care. This book did not engage me the way her other books have. I'm sorry to say that I didn't finish this book. I would recommend it to others because everyone's opinion and taste is not the same.

I struggled through this one but managed to get it read. It had such an interesting premise, at least the first part, but fell short in several ways. First of all, it was way longer than it needed to be, dragging on and on. And the background story (death of father) just didn't seem cohesive with the rest of the book. I can't imagine someone that is grieving getting so involved in solving crimes but that may just be me. As for the author borrowing the Idaho college murder story, perhaps she would have been better off inventing a crime rather than speculating on one so fresh in our minds. Something about that just felt off and a bit disrespectful so I won't recommend this one. My thanks to Sourcebooks Landmark for providing a review copy via NetGalley. All opinions are my own.

Thank you NetGalley for this advanced copy of This Book Will Bury Me by Ashley Winstead. I love her. Is there anything she can't write.

I really enjoyed this one. Lots of twists and turns. A interesting perspective on true crime and all the 'junkies' out there. I did see the twist of the killers coming, that was the only flaw (maybe i've read too many thrillers lately).

All and all a good time. Can't wait to see what Winstead comes up with next.

On Jane’s father’s death, she loses herself and drops out of college, spending her days building a shrine to him and wondering why life can be so cruel. Shortly after his death, she begins to find solace with the online amateur sleuthing community, spending all of her time helping to solve high-profile murders across the country. She gets particularly close with a lovable ragtag group of four other amateur sleuths who become infamous for their work. In one case, Jane finds her own self in the dangerous path of a serial killer.

I really enjoyed this one although it was slightly odd to read what I believe to have been meant as a book within a book…? I loved the true crime/amateur sleuth theme, the character development, and it was a really interesting plot. I definitely didn’t see the end coming!

I decided to listen on audio and enjoyed the narration.

Thank you so much to Sourcebooks, Tantor Audio, Ashley, NetGalley for the e-galley and audiobook!

This is a bit of a tricky one for me to review...

Being a true crime fan, and hearing that the author loosely based this book off of the Idaho murders that took place in November of 2022, I was intrigued. But while I was reading this, I felt that it was too soon to go there. The murders and victims in the book were almost exact to the real case, which hasn't even gone to trial yet. Maybe it wouldn't have bothered me quite as much if justice had already been served for the four victims, but I'm not sure.

Parts of this book were still enjoyable, although it was a slow burn and fairly lengthy at 480 pages. I did find the characters to be interesting and likable, which held my interest. I loved Jane and how she found and became part of this internet sleuthing group as a way to deal with her grief over her father's death. They became the support group she needed, and she found that she was a pretty good "armchair detective."

Even though I didn't love this one, I'm still a fan of this author, so I'll be anxiously awaiting her next release!

Thank you, @netgalley, and @bookmarked for the #gifted e-arc!

This book really benefited from being told as a pseudo memoir and the media elements were really good! Overall, it was good but nothing was particularly gripping. Even though the main character was pulled into everything from her father's death, nothing about the father really played well in the book, it just felt like filler.