CW: trauma, abuse, depictions of mental health, some others

Read as an ARC via NetGalley. “Lenny Marks Gets Away With Murder” is available now!

37 year old Lenny Marks is quite content with the way her life is going. She goes to work, comes home, and not much else. Her meals are planned, her schedule is routine, and there are no surprises. Lenny Marks does not like surprises. So when a letter arrives at her work notifying her of just such a surprise, and a wholly unwelcome one at that, it throws everything off. The more Lenny tries to hold onto her routine, the more her hazy past seems to disrupt it. Even worse, though, Lenny starts to remember.

My first thought as I was reading this was, “my god, this woman is neurodivergent as hell.” Eventually, this was followed by, “ohhhhh, it’s the trauma.” By the end, it was, “oh, no, wait, it’s both.” So, basically, I loved it. Seriously though, this was such a good read, and it really hit all of those pesky little emotions along the way.

The real star of the show here is Lenny herself. The setting is ultimately a minor detail, and relatively understated. The plot, though incredibly interesting, is ultimately focused on Lenny, which makes this a character-driven story. And since Lenny is the main character, we’ve come full circle back to my original statement: Lenny is what makes this book incredible.

In the beginning of the story, we get a good look into exactly what Lenny’s life has been since she became an adult. Specifically, her life is routine. Everything is just so, and very understated, and there are no changes unless absolutely unavoidable. It’s a feeling that resonates really strongly with me because I, like Lenny, absolutely detest change. People, for Lenny, are confusing and uncomfortable and it’s really just better if such interpersonal dealings are left to others. We then get to see everything as Lenny tries desperately to hold herself together; memory is a tricky thing, especially when there’s trauma involved, and what Lenny remembers may or may not be what really happened. Coming to terms with that, and dealing with her history, and learning to interact with people—all of these things are difficult and uncomfortable and portrayed so brilliantly that I don’t even know where to truly begin discussing them. By the end of things you just want to give the poor woman a hug and also go on the warpath and also crawl under a blanket and hide from the world. It’s uncomfortable and awkward and heart wrenching and a little bit funny and a lot of something I can’t quite name and it’s all still somehow so cozy. But also, there’s this creeping sense of something being off and you just *know* that it’s going to be bad but you can’t quite stop yourself hurtling towards the truth.

I don’t know how the author managed to pull it off, but this book managed to do all the things while having relatively little in the way of actual outside events happening to the MC. It’s a style that I normally struggle to get through, but I couldn’t put it down; I think a lot of that has to do with it being the equivalent of your brain melting and having to be rebuilt because everything you thought you knew was wrong and also right and somehow it’s all delivered without being terrifying. If you want an emotional story that somehow still manages to be engaging and insightful and entertaining, with a protagonist who doesn’t really fit in her own skin, and a lurking, impending sense of dread without the anxiety, then this is the book for you.

Lenny Marks Gets Away With Murder - Likewise Book Reviews

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