We Are All the Same in The Dark by Julia Heaberlin was a breath-taking masterpiece. I finished it half an hour ago and I still have a feeling of dread deep in my stomach. The night before a fourteen-hour shift at work I was up past 1AM wondering if I really needed sleep or if I could carry on reading.
I have read and loved other books by this author, but We Are All the Same in the Dark is on another level. There is some seriously high-quality writing and it is dramatic without compromising the reader’s relationship with the characters.
The multiple point of view form lends itself very well to this book and I felt it helped me associate with all of the characters much more.
It’s been a decade since Trumanell Brandon disappeared but the people in the small town in Texas where she lives haven’t forgotten her.
Most of them think her brother Wyatt killed her and he has been an outsider ever since her disappearance, but he is just as desperate for answers as everyone else. When he finds a lost young girl he believes it is a sign.
For new cop Odette the young girl’s appearance opens old wounds and in trying to protect her she discovers shocking surprises from the past.
We Are All the Same in the Dark is creepy and mesmerising from its opening lines:
“It takes eight to ten hours to hand-dig a grave, more if you was doing it in the dark, five to six if you have a helper. It aint like the movies.” This is from a true crime documentary on Trumanell’s death.
Discerning readers will realise that there is something slightly off about Wyatt’s account in the first part of the book.
“She has a bad, bad mystery to her. I can feel it deep in the hollow of my spook bone, the one my dad broke when I was a kid. My arm is never wrong.”
It is immediately clear to the reader that the girl’s appearance is going to stir something up.
“A mystery girl spread still, off the highway, her head sparkling like some kind of desert angel with her wings clipped. She is twelve, maybe thirteen. Ten. Hell, I can’t tell. Girls these days look, fifteen when they’re eleven to men like me.
She’s lying barefoot on the baked ground about three feet behind a barbed wire fence, trucks blasting by hot and heavy on the other side. Lips as read as Snow White. A scarf with gold sequins is tied tight over one of her eye’s like she’s been bandaged by a princess. Or, maybe she’s the princess. Or maybe she’s just a normal girl without a lot of Band-Aid options.”
Wyatt’s part of the book gives us several glimpses into Trumanell’s tough early childhood experiences.
“Daddy hit us sometimes. But mostly he just played with our minds.”
Wyatt’s chapter gives us no insight into the events on the night of Trumanell’s disappearance.
“A decade later, nobody in town has the full picture of what happened out here at the Branson place. They just shake my cattle gate, seethe, and wonder.”
Odette’s chapters form the main bulk of the book. For me Odette was quite a difficult character to pin down. She clearly loves her job and has the potential to be a brilliant cop but her feelings for Wyatt and her close proximity to the events surrounding the disappearance of Trumanell sometimes cloud her judgement. The other issue is the shadowy history surrounding The Blue House and the fact that the night Trumanell went missing is the last time Odette had use of both her legs. That night she was involved in an accident meaning one of her legs had to be amputated.
Via Odette’s chapters we learn more about the month’s after Trumanell’s disappearance and the campaign against Wyatt.
“They hunted for nineteen-year-old Trumanell with shovels, backhoes and metal detectors. They smashed windows with rifle butts, shredded crime scene tape, slaughtered wheat, dug holes until rats and snakes slithered homeless across a field turned into an apocalyptic, deeply pocked moon.”
Odette moved away from the town for a while but almost five years ago convinced her husband Finn to move back for a trial period of five years. Her obsessive search for answers has almost destroyed her marriage, that and her complex relationship with Wyatt.
Odette is “more afraid of leaving things unfinished here than eventually going all in and finishing them.”
Her dad was closely involved in working the case and fiercely defended Wyatt’s innocence until he died. Odette believes he knew more about the case than was officially recorded and that provides some of the motivation behind her search for the truth.
“Daddy told me never to come back to this town. But he also made a silent will that he never put to paper, with Wyatt as my inheritance.”
Odette is very close to her partner Rusty but even he thinks she is crazy for defending Wyatt.
Odette checks in on Wyatt regularly because of his mental state. She has a close and clouded relationship with him, and their shared history means she can decode different things he says and does.
“Wyatt is massaging the same arm I grabbed, the one his father broke when he was ten by pushing him off a tractor. He says that arm has told him things since.
The rubbing means he’s bothered. There’s so much I know about Wyatt that I wish I didn’t. So many reasons I think he’s innocent even with a strange girl trembling on his couch and acid rolling in my gut.”
The girl on the couch only has one eye. How she lost her eye is just one of the mysteries surrounding her, a mystery Odette is determined to uncover even though the girl refuses to talk.
Odette decides to try and keep the girl’s appearance a secret and tries to convince her to tell other’s that she was the one who found her. She also attempts to explain to her about Wyatt and why he has conservations with someone who isn’t there.
“Wyatt’s sister is gone…tragically. His mind is still trying to wrap around the trauma. The grief. But I don’t think he is crazy. Let me put it this way. I lost a part of a leg. But I’m not handicapped. You lost an eye, and neither are you. We are whole human beings existing the best we can without a part. And that’s Wyatt. That’s everybody who is a survivor.”
The reader begins to believe that Wyatt is simply misunderstood but there is always pockets of doubt. Even Maggie, Odette’s cousin believes that Odette is putting herself in danger by continuing to associate with him.
“You are not responsible.” Maggie has lowered her tone. “For Trumanell or Wyatt. Or me or even that girl. This town should have fucking saved Trumanell when she was alive. Our father’s should have saved her. Everybody knew something was wrong out there, even me and I was a kid.This is about people bored with their lives, with something to prove, and an old boyfriend who always, always had a black river running in him. You owe him and this town, nothing. She pauses, “I’m scared for you. Please be careful.”
The final section of the book is from the point of view of Angel, the one-eyed girl. This is where we finally learn her story and a whole bunch of other secrets come out.
This is also where we learn that Angel is not quite as fragile as she seems to be.
“I hop out and toss the man a smile with lots of teeth when I pass by. Oklahoma girls are raised to do that like we are all pageant material, but we’re prepared to stab you in the gut.”
Both the female protagonists are particularly strong and that is just one of many things that contributed to me loving this book.
We Are All the Same in the Dark has earned it’s place among my favourite books of all time.
I think the book hangover from We Are All the Same in the Dark will be severe. I will be buying this book for myself and all my friends and family.

I'm a great Heaberlin fan having read her last four books: this one starts brilliantly with her usual mix of twisty darkness with emotional intensity and I *loved* Odette and her relations with Wyatt and Finn. And then, at just past 50%... it all dropped off a cliff! I can't say why because of spoilers but I was gutted and, for me, it never really picked up again. The revelation at the end came out of nowhere with none of the emotional impact I'd expected and even who does the telling (and it is very told at that stage) just felt off. Not sure what happened here after such a strong beginning. For me, 5 stars at the start, 2 stars for the second half = 3 stars overall. But this could have been so, so much better if it had followed the trajectory of the first half. So disappointing.

Beautiful cover!

No lie I really hated the writing style when I began but stick with it... now writing this I love the writing style. It added to the atmosphere. Just great storytelling! It’s a longer than usual book but not a single word is wasted!

What a beautiful, complicated character Odette is, she’s fiery, she’s emotional, kind and she absolutely kicks arse! I loved her. I loved Angel as well. Two well written plucky female characters is always a plus for me!

I loved racing towards the end but I did not enjoy the last 5% of the story. It came out of nowhere and didn’t feel connected. With a better ending this would be a 5/5.

This is a compelling psychological thriller, which is well-researched and also does well on local colour in its Central Texas setting. The novel primarily sets out to show how "life changing injuries" as the police describe them when they are inflicted on someone, actually change lives.

The author mostly manages to avoid careless stereotypes, although the psychologist character is seriously bonkers (that may be based on experience rather than prejudice and I am not finding real fault there) and the Baptist Minister is not only described as being like something out of the Handmaid’s Tale by one of the other characters: the character does indeed seem to hail from there.

This book is being offered to a British readership and whilst American readers may presumably take it as read that a Baptist minister is going to be a snake oil and brimstone phoney, “Baptist Minister” is one of those terms which has a much more positive meaning in the United Kingdom than it appears to have in the United States. Unless the negative view is something unique to the author or some faction which she represents. The positive image has a lot to do with John Bunyan, who preached and wrote, in England after the Pilgrim Fathers had sailed.

The suspense lasts until the end of the book, though the mystery frankly does not.

I read and raved about "Black Eyed Susans" -but dare I say this novel is better than that ?
Set in a small town near Oklahoma -It has been 10 years since 16 year old Trumanelle (fantastic name ) Branson along with her father disappeared off the face of the earth . The only suspect was her older brother Wyatt who was released without charge -but has been under suspicion ever since.
Wyatt's ex- girlfriend -Odette -(another great name !) is with the local police and still investigates the disappearance in her own time..
One day Wyatt finds a 10 year old girl in the fields -a runaway. . Odette helps her and in doing so -uncovers a clue to Trumanelle's disappearance -only to disappear herself ...

This is a fantastic read -the plot -the characters -there was nothing I didn't like about this book - a well deserved 5 stars from me

We are all the Same in the Dark by Julia Heaberlin is completely gripping - I could not put it down. It is the story of town that is haunted by the disappearance and possible death of a young woman called Trumanell and her abusive father. Her sibling Wyatt is the only survivor of whatever happened on their farm and is a suspect. Years later, his ex-girlfriend, Odette, who is now a policewoman is haunted by the tragedy and is determined to solve the mystery of Trumanell’s disappearance and risks everything in the process. The story is told from a few different viewpoints and my favourite is when it is told from Odette’s. There are a number of twists and turns throughout the story and there are very few characters that seem trustworthy. This adds to how gripping and suspenseful it is and the overarching air of menace. I have previously really enjoyed Black-Eyed Susan’s which is also by Heaberlin but I have to say that I enjoyed this more. It is a great read!

Dark and twisted with characters that are truly out of the box, We are all the same in the dark kept me gripped and guessing right to the end. This is a thriller set in a foreign world. They may speak English in Texas but it is wild and dangerous country and finding a one-eyed girl abandoned at the side of the road surrounded by dandelions, is not that surprising. Odette is a cop, following in her father's footsteps, and her former boyfriend found the girl. We then get pulled into an unsolved murder case of a father and daughter whose bodies were never found and which Odette is determined to solve. This is definitely not your usual thriller, it is deeper and more complex, but as a result, more satisfying.

Having enjoyed 'Black Eyed Susans', I was really excited to receive my copy of 'We are all the same in the Dark' - I wasn't disappointed! This is a truly gripping and dark tale, which opens with a very original scene of a man finding an abandoned girl by the side of a road outside a Texas town. The town is already obsessed with the disappearance of a local girl and her father some years before. This book had me reading it as much as I could in order to find out the fate of the characters; it is a dark and gothic tale, told by three narrators, and is very well written. Highly recommended.

My thanks to NetGalley and publisher Penguin Michael Joseph UK, for the ARC.

I really enjoyed this book. After what appears to be a slow start the story gradually unfolds with past events dramatically colliding with the present; surprises and twists; long-held secrets shattered and the truth revealed. It's well-written with good characters and dialogue, and the conclusion is perfectly crafted.

Ten years ago Odette Tucker, the daughter and granddaughter of police officers in small-town Texas, was best friends with 19yr-old Trumanell (Tru) Branson and her older brother Wyatt. Calling at their family farmhouse Odette is urged to RUN when Wyatt opened the door; she did, and crashed her car which led to her leg being amputated. That night Wyatt's father killed his wife and disappeared. Tru disappeared as well, leaving only a bloody handprint. Wyatt and his father were both suspects but nothing could be proved, and Wyatt remained under suspicion and lived a reclusive life at the farm.

Ten years later, fit and sporting a titanium prothesis, her father having died, Odette returns to the town as a police officer. Alerted by an anonymous call saying that Wyatt had a young girl at the farm, Odette discovers 'Angel' whom Wyatt had found on the edge of a field. She also finds that Wyatt talks to, and sees, his missing sister. Angel is distinctive because she only has one eye intact. Odette is determined to find out who she is and who she is running from, but is equally determined to reexamine the investigation into Tru's disappearance.

No more or we'll be in the realms of spoilers!
But there definitely is a LOT more - some bits are heart-warming and tender, others are heart-wrenching or heart-breaking. Lots of misdirection here, and definitely a surprising and major twist. Didn't see THAT one coming!

My thanks to Michael Joseph and Netgalley for the copy of this eBook in exchange for a fair and unbiased review.
In a world where forensic knowledge and technic provides so much evidence and well-trained detectives, authors of thrillers will inevitably return to that all familiar trope cold case file. These are frequently linked to a new crime also usually unsolved or wrongly solved.
That is not to say all these plots are clichés it is just that one would like a little more imagination from the author.
In this novel, I found myself not believing in so much of the background, the description of the community and its narrow viewpoint, the familiar isolation of one of the protagonists, the unlikely police officer all at sixes and sevens felt to me to be a hotchpot of ideas badly constructed and rushed in its execution.
If this is a true representation of small-town America it would explain so many of the problems the country suffers.
Three stars for effort and because I know the author could do better

Having enjoyed previous books by this author, I was pretty excited to read this. Some parts of the book were really gripping and I found myself squeezing in a page or two wherever possible. Other parts were just plain confusing, like the author had a few books' worth ideas for twists and decided to just use them all in this one. I also found having characters called Rod and Rodney unnecessarily confusing.

I’m afraid I didn’t really enjoy this book as much as I thought I would. Like other reviewers I felt it was a little bit too slow. It had a very confusing story line until the end when things started to join up but I’m afraid it wasn’t my cup of tea.

I absolutely loved this book.
The pre-read book cover comments about most crime/mystery/psychological thriller books (which are my bread and butter reading) always talk about twists and turns you won't see coming but often this is hardly the case.
However, with We Are All The Same In The Dark, you get a massive twist that completely changes how you expected the book would progress to it's conclusion. I think it might, for me at least, be the best twist since I read The Kind Worth Killing several years ago.
The storyline predominantly keeps to chapters that progress consecutively in time rather than the alternate chapter timelines very popular in many books.
The revelations at the end are plausible and surprising. As usual I didn't work out who the culprit was!
Definitely in the 'couldn't put it down' category and it thoroughly deserves a 5 star rating

A compulsive read that I found hard to put down. I was disappointed by the ending though - it felt as though the author had suddenly become bored with the story and decided to tidy up the loose ends and go on to something else! There seemed to be several opportunities for the author to take us in potentially interesting directions (I was pretty well gripped at that stage) but for me it just didn't seem to happen. There is a lot to like though.

What a truly gripping book.. What begins as a mystery story very quickly develops into a story about humanity. People you completely interact with - their lives, foibles and all. A suspenseful and twisted story.

I absolutely loved Black Eyed Susans and was really looking forward to this book. Sadly I found it extremely confusing; I couldn't work out which characters were which, there were long descriptions of mundane things and so many Americanisms (I assume they were) that I lost track. When I highlighted the words to get a meaning I got "we can't find a meaning" Why on earth you would call someone Trumanelle I can't begin to fathom but then Trumanisters were mentioned so was this a cult or something? At one point we were told that Egyptian Princesses were left to rot in the sun and then on the next page they were Greek! I found it very disjointed with a confusing plot time line and I found it hard to concentrate on the book.. And did nobody spot a fresh grave dug twice? I couldn't quite believe that. In the end I wasn't sure who was dead, who was alive or who was telling the story. I will try this author again but this was so disappointing.

This story just didn’t flow well for me, I lost interest as I felt it jumped from here to there and I got confused. I tried to read it in instalments which helped a bit with the slow building storyline, a dark, intriguing and mystifying read, you need patience and the ability to persevere as deeply imbedded is a good story.

This started as a slow burner and I wasn’t sure if I was going to stick with it but I’m glad I did. It was a little difficult to follow initially as it came from 3 different viewpoints but once the characters became well known and more familiar it worked really well and was an enjoyable book

We Are All The Same In The Dark was one of the most atmospheric psychological thrillers I have read in quite a while.. a twisty yet considered tale that has some thought provoking social themes running through the narrative and two women who will steal a little bit of your soul.

There's a mystery of course, at the heart of it, but the real strength of this comes in its relationships...built on years of silence and difficult life circumstances. The two main protagonists come together for the briefest of times yet the affects of that ripple down the years.

The author manages to floor you a couple of times keeping the feel of it unexpected and off kilter. The writing is genuinely superb and the whole thing builds to a quietly emotional crescendo.

Most excellent. One to watch in 2020.

I quickly realised this book was just not for me. It made me feel oddly uncomfortable. It was also a very slow burner. Unfortunately I chose not to finish.