The God of the Woods by Liz Moore

“It was wonderful, thought Tracy, having friends like these, who seemed to see the parts of yourself you worked hardest to hide, and bring them into the light and celebrate them with a sort of tender ribbing that uplifted more than it put down.”

In August 1975, at a summer camp in the Adirondacks, camp counselor, Louise, wakes to find one of the campers is missing. Barbara Van Laar is not in her bed and after a search of the camp, the authorities are called. This is not the first Van Laar child to go missing; fourteen years ago, Bear Van Laar, Barbara’s older brother, went missing when he was eight. Detectives, camp staff, the Van Laar family and friends, and the town begin a search and investigation to see if the two disappearances are related or if the Van Laar’s are a cursed Albany dynasty.

This story is told in multiple timelines (but have no fear – each chapter head will orient you as you read) and from multiples POVs. We follow Louise, a camp counselor struggling to help her brother and mother; Tracy, Barbara’s bunk-mate and friend; Judyta (“Judy”), a recently promoted investigator working hard to prove herself to her male counterparts; Alice, Barbara and Bear’s mother who has struggled with her mental health and substance use over the years; in addition to other characters. While the list sounds long, in Liz Moore’s skilled hands, the story is easy to follow. The summer camp setting with the wealthy owners summering on the property make for the perfect setting to this literary suspense/mystery novel. While this is a very different novel from Moore’s Long Bright River, it is just as compelling and perfectly constructed.

I highly recommend reading this literary mystery if you enjoy literary fiction, mysteries, or historical fiction.

Check out The God of the Woods by Liz Moore for yourself from the Library (https://catalog.lclibs.org/polaris/search/title.aspx…).