Diane Donovan, Senior Reviewer for the Midwest Book Review, wrote a sizzling good review for my forthcoming “The Girl Goes Home (Emily Calby Book 4)”, available in paperback and Kindle on January 1, 2025. You can preorder the Kindle on Amazon. Below is the full review. Here’s her bottom line: “Fierce, attention-grabbing, and thought-provoking, The Girl Goes Home is a masterwork of psychological suspense.”
The Girl Goes Home
Dorian Box
Friction Press
978-1-7346399-5-7 $4.99 ebook/$11.99 paperback
The Girl Goes Home, the fourth book in the Emily Calby Series, will intrigue newcomers and prior fans alike. While there’s a trend in modern writing to create strong female protagonists, it should be noted that Emily is not just strong—she’s fierce.
This ferocity is captured in an opening first-person journal extract from Emily’s past that is the perfect medium for immediately translating Emily’s special challenges and perceptions into a likeable character whom readers will find compelling from the story’s opening lines:
Hi Journal. Dr. Townsend told me to keep you. He said it could help with my trauma disorders. I don’t see how writing can fix anything, but if going along gets me out of this psych ward sooner it’s worth it. My disorders have long names. I still have to look them up to spell them right. Dissociative this and dissociative that, all fancy ways of saying my brain is broken, like the mirror in the bathroom at the hospital.
This affection develops quickly despite the quick admonition by this young writer that she’s developed an uncommon, dangerous proclivity towards violence:
I am Emily Blair Calby. I turned thirteen last month. I like to play softball and take care of my little sister and be with my best friend, Meggie Tribet. Liked. My whole life is past tense. The day the two men came was the end of everything.
Now I like to kill people. Haha. Just kidding. I don’t like it.
Her journal entry sets the stage for a story that then moves to the present and describes young lawyer Zack Skellar learning about a particularly grisly murder history, the Calby Murders, covered at a lecture devoted to the history of murders that shaped legal precedents.
Emily is now in her twenties and involved in her own new start in life as a lawyer, but the past is never far behind. As the only survivor of a terrible murder scene, she carries the scars and burden of knowledge which re-emerge when new facts evolve into her own life’s cold case.
Dorian Box is a master at crafting scenarios and investigations that center on a proactive young woman’s determination to unravel a mystery that holds family secrets, new threats to the ones she loves, and a terrible impact on her choices and survival.
The psychological elements of trauma and discovery entwine in delightful ways that emerge from Emily’s past in unexpected, compelling manners as she involves Zack and journalist Briley Carr in the true crime investigation of a lifetime.
Many nuances of discovery and danger are outlined clearly for readers as Emily attempts to solve matters that revolve around her identity. Wry humor emerges at unexpected moments to juxtapose the serious elements with comic relief.
Readers who join Emily in her rollercoaster ride will find the story replete with unexpected twists and turns and an ever-expanding cast of characters that each lend their own special insights into the intrigue and suspense which are strong allures to the story.
Libraries looking for murder mysteries entwined with powerful characterization, unexpected dilemmas, and a young woman who struggles to understand and cope with her tragic past, will want to look at this one. The Girl Goes Home both builds on prior books and yet stands nicely alone for newcomers.
Be prepared for a completely immersive story that asks major questions (and answers some) that victims can harbor:
Why them? Why their family?
The answer will surprise.
Fierce, attention-grabbing, and thought-provoking, The Girl Goes Home is a masterwork of psychological suspense.
Thanks to Ms. Donovan and the Midwest Book Review!