I’m going to tell you right off the bat, if you’re into mystery thrillers, you’ve read some variation of Bonfire‘s storyline a million times before: a girl from a small town with a cold disposition and strained relationships moves to the big city to become a lawyer / journalist / etc. Girl comes back 10+ years later to solve a mystery, or resolve tangled threads of her past, which usually involves one of the popular girls who went missing around the same time our protagonist left their small town….
Why 4 Stars for Bonfire?
You’re probably wondering how I wound up giving Krysten Ritters debut novel 4-stars on GR. Well… I don’t know, it was simply bingeable. It was an easy and enjoyable read. Think Erin Brockovich, Dark Places, and All The Missing Girls had a baby, that baby would be Bonfire.
The story was nothing spectacular, but it was enjoyable enough. With zero likable characters — scratch that, every character was predictable and two dimensional — our ErinBrockovich–DarkPlaces–AllTheMissingGirls mash-up was good enough to keep the pages turning (or in my case, kept the audiobook playing (that doesn’t roll off the tongue as nicely)). Even with all of the dings that Bonfire had against it, it all flowed together. Perhaps it was the quick pacing. Or the subtle breadcrumb trail of clues Ritter left for us. It all simply worked well with our predictable storyline. The main mystery was gripping enough to keep you just barely interested and care about the folks affected by the small town water scandal. It’s the classic corporate greed vs. the good of the people case. A David and Goliath?
Worth the Read?
Yep! I’d say so. I was excited to see Bonfire was available at the library, I immediately downloaded it, as it had been on my list since it was released in 2017. I really like Krysten Ritter — I thought she was wonderful in Breaking Bad and had no idea she had ‘writer’ under her repertoire. Ritter’s debut book is only 256 pages long, which equates to a short audiobook (less than 12 hours), so I was able to finish it in under a week, between stroller walks and cooking. Anyway, I would recommend it, but go into it knowing that you’ve read this type of story before. Don’t expect anything mind-blowing. And with that, enjoy!