In the year of 1986, Eddie and his group of friends had all been teenagers once and some of the group had wonderful childhoods and some of them didn't. Eddie and his friends would always meet up and hang out but they also had a secret chalk code they would use to communicate with each other. Every person had a different color so it meant something. As they were younger and living at home, they always had a secret meeting spot in the woods and everything was fine until Mickey ran his mouth to his brother Sean about their secret code. Sean and Mickey are brothers and are very close but Sean is also a bully and loves to pick on his brother's friends. Throughout the book, it goes from past to present and is very very confusing to keep up with. Eddie was on his way to meet his friends when he found the body of a teenaged girl who's body had been claimed dead. That's when everything changed....... 

In the year of 2016, Eddie is now a grown man and lives in his childhood house still and is also a teacher at the school. Everything is all happy until he gets a letter in the mail with no return address and he can't figure out who sent it. He has contacted his childhood friends and they have all received the same message but can't figure it out either. After years of no contact with each of them, Eddie didn't think this whole situation was a big deal but he didn't want to have to dig in the past to figure this out. His safety is now on the line of danger but his childhood friend who has came back into town is now killed right after he leaves Eddie's house. 

Sean's way of revenge was totally out of the park. Totally disgusting and the fact that he raped a girl in the book and got her pregnant is now a big deal. Now that the kids are all grown up, Mr. Halloran and Eddie have an inside secret with each other. Mr.Halloran told Eddie he wouldn't say what happened that day at the park when he caught Sean forcing Eddie to do something very inappropriate outside as long as he wouldn't share his secret of him liking younger women. 

I will say right now if you do not do well with abortion, rape, murder, death, and sexual assault then this book is not for you. The ending made absolutely no sense and it was very confusing to keep up with. The chalk figures that were left was very cheesy and the characters were not likable AT ALL. Complete waste of my fucking time and for the sake of others..... highly wouldn't recommend. I will say the whole book felt rushed and something is not right about this.

Read within a day. Loved. I found myself unable to put the book down!

 Fiction / Horror / Mystery / Thriller / Crime / Suspense
⭐⭐⭐/5
TW: SA (graphic once, but mentioned in different ways throughout)

I am not sure what to say about this story. It was creepy. It had its good parts and its bad parts? I was left confused and underwhelmed? I am rather unsure how I feel about it as a whole.
 

 
I feel like the author kept trying to justify inappropriate adult-child relationships. Like the one that was forced was bad, but because the young girl liked the teacher back that one wasn't bad, TF?!! Both shouldn't have happened, and neither should be condoned.
Can we also acknowledge that he was sexually assaulted!! They kept glazing over that Other than when he asked about the accusation made at the church "What he did to you - some people would give that same name."
I have no idea how it won the awards it did.
Will like this if you like Stephen King? For me it is like SCI Fi movies it's the B-rated version of Stand By Me.
I grew up in a small US town in the 1980s, yet I felt so disconnected from the flashbacks, maybe it is a UK v US thing? I never believed they were 80's kids.
I had such high hopes for this read because The Burning Girls is one of my 5-star reads for this year, after DNFing The Drift, and now my experience with this I am starting to think it was a one-off. 

I am using this for a challenge I am just not sure which one yet. 

The resolution was slightly disappointing but the ending was enough to win me back. It’s hard for a book to keep my attention but this was really very good. 

100 pages in I realised that this mystery did not grip me at all. I had no interest in who the girl (found dead) is, who her killer is, the role of the characters in this mystery... For a thriller, that's a really bad sign. I'd rather invest my time in a book that's more interesting and I don't think I'll pick this book up again. 

The SA of the MC by his bully (Sean) and the overall way in which women and relationships between men and women were described was also disgusting. I'm so sick and tired of thrillers that objectify women and write about SA/inappropriate relationships without critical engagement. Yuck.