"A stunning, intelligent, powerful crime novel that aches with poignant, vivid intensity. A LoveReading Star Book."
This intelligent, beautifully eloquent and powerful crime novel thoroughly provoked my feelings, and still remains in my thoughts. Mickey Fitzpatrick is a police officer patrolling the area she grew up in. Kensington in Philadelphia is known for drugs and sex workers, when a killer arrives on the streets, Mickey prays that her little sister doesn’t become a victim. The author Liz Moore has an intimate knowledge of the real Kensington, she has interviewed the people drawn there by drugs, written non fiction, and completed community work, she obviously cares a great deal for this neighbourhood and its people. Her novel set in Kensington has been a long time in the coming, she wanted to: “do this world justice”, to: “fairly represent”. As I started to read, the ‘list’ stopped me in my tracks, I read it again, pondered, and then moved on to the first two pages which hit my mind with a wallop and gave it a good shake. Mickey narrates her story, she is so clear, sharp, on point, and I could see, feel, taste her words. Kensington, Mickey and her family flooded my mind in short, fierce, expressive chapters of ‘then’ and ‘now’. I felt a connection to emotions, to this story, it truly spoke to me. I feel this novel will be one that I regularly return to, and I’ll take away something a little different each time. Long Bright River is a stunning read, it aches with poignant, vivid intensity and I absolutely loved it. There is no other option for me, than to choose it as a LoveReading Star Book, and a Liz Robinson Pick of the Month.
| Primary Genre | Crime and Mystery |
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Uncompromising portrait of a neighbourhood devastated by the opioid crisis and an intimate look at two emotionally damaged sisters divided by an addiction.
Uncompromising portrait of a neighbourhood devastated by the opioid crisis and an intimate look at two emotionally damaged sisters divided by an addiction.
Hard-hitting and emotionally charged, Liz Moore’s timely novel is part police procedural but in the main a riveting literary family drama of the complicated and emotionally fraught relationship between two sisters in the beleaguered neighbourhood of Kensington, Philadelphia. Thirty-two-year-old PPD patrol officer, single mother and narrator, Michaela “Mickey” Fitzpatrick, grew up in the neighbourhood and tersely tells her new partner that most of the crimes revolve around someone seeking a fix or in the aftermath of one, with an overdose in progress a regular occurrence.... Read Full Review
A gritty, engaging police procedural, full of twists and a fantastic sense of American underworld.
Fantastic, gritty and engaging crime mystery steeped deep in the world of addiction. A police procedural novel about drug addiction, the criminal underworld, bribery and abuse set in Kensington, Philadelphia. It was all of this and much more. Very intelligently written and very sensitively put. Alongside the darker themes, this book also explored Siblings bond, family interaction, the need to protect and need to help shine brightly in Long Bright River. The author sets an example for a crime thriller but with a heart and with complex characters, where no one is what they seem - no one is a saint, not even the main character, Mickey.
I have really enjoyed the sense of mystery, looking for a lost sister in a world where you choose the danger, you choose your way and how to deal with life's injustices.... Read Full Review
This story is a crime thriller like no other, tender, thought provoking, engaging and sadly all too realistic and raw but I was riveted from the very first page to the last and although not an easy read, it was informative and entertaining in equal parts.
I’m so pleased to have finished 2020 with a book that I connected with so strongly. When you feel so bereft after a story has finished and you continue thinking about the characters long after you’ve closed the last page, you know that book will stay with you a very long time.
Long Bright River written by Liz Moore, best selling author of Heft, has created a heartbreaking, at times harrowing but compassionate story involving the pressure opioid addiction places on families and the effects on newborn children to addicted mothers. Full of empathy, this story deeply affected me, as a mother, as a human being, I was utterly engrossed and astounded at just how the opioid crisis has a knock on effect to all involved.... Read Full Review
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