I enjoyed this book on quite a few levels, it was a good mystery/thriller but it also has a compelling personal story. I think it was even better than the first one in the series and I'm looking forward to more from Julia Dahl. (Editorial note, since I finished this after Midnight last night I'm now going to extend and expand my review) I have been very interested in the immersive nature of the 2 Rebekah Roberts books. I truly feel like I am being transported to a different world when the story is taking place in the ultra orthodox community. I think I have always found books that do this to be amongst my favorites and I love that here I'm reading a book set in my own time in an area I know well but it seems to be other worldly. Of course, having a journalist as a main character works for me too, I read so many of them and Rebekah is a very well drawn character, not surprising given Ms. Dahl's work. As I said above, this is one series I am very excited about continuing.

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Run You Down – Gripping

Run You Down is the follow up to the successful debut Invisible City by Julia Dahl, and she does not let you down. The great thing about this book is that you do not need to have read the previous book to enjoy this, it is an excellent standalone thriller.

Aviva Kagan, a teenage Hasidic Jew wants out of the restrictive life, she wants to live, she wants to escape everything about the community. Aviva is in love with a college boy, Brian and they are in love. They run away to Florida to where he is studying, but Aviva has finally escaped Brooklyn and her community. When she gives birth, she knows she cannot cope with being a parent and runs away leaving behind her daughter, Rebekah.

Twenty three years later Rebekah is a reporter with the New York Tribune, and making quite a name for herself, especially looking at the religious communities, and the secrets they hold. When an ultra-Orthodox Jew approaches Rebekah with the story of his wife’s death and he thinks she has been murdered and nobody cares.

Little does Rebekah know that she is being drawn into a world her mother did so much to escape. While at the same time, she finds that White Supremacists might be involved in the story and a long lost uncle. She cannot get her head around the story at first, and for the first time she reaches out to her mother, and a world she does not understand.

Julia Dahl has written a great thriller, that crosses the bounds of New York States Jewish communities, White Supremacists and the politics involved. With a deft touch, she writes about race, religion and politics in New York, without preaching. An excellent and believable thriller that is gripping. ( )

Journalist Rebekah is struggling to put her life back together after the trauma she experienced in Invisible City, and she's just coasting at work until a call comes in about another possible murder in an orthodox community just north of New York. It turns out that there are even more possible connections with her mother, who disappeared from Rebekah's life when she was an infant. Alternating chapters are from the mother's point of view, and shed some light on the present day murder. Readers will be pleased with the satisfying ending. ( )

This is a completely different kind of novel that also has its roots in the Ultra-Orthodox community. It is the story of a teenager who had a fling with a college boy, had a child, and left her daughter and her Hasidic Jewish life in Brooklyn and just disappeared. Years later, this child, now a NYC tabloid reporter, is drawn back into this insular world to investigate a mysterious death. She is not sure she wants to re-connect to a mother she has never known. Racism, white supremacy, anti-Semitism, and homophobia make this a gripping read. Readers will find it fast paced, suspenseful, and hard-to-put-down.

In this sequel to "Invisible City", Rebekah Roberts—a twenty-three-year-old stringer for a New York City tabloid—is struggling to recover from the emotional trauma inflicted by her first investigation, which took her into the insular Hasidic community in Brooklyn, her mother’s hometown. Rebekah is Jewish by birth but still new to Jewish practice since she was raised by her Christian father after her mother abandoned them both when Rebekah was a baby. Rebekah’s latest investigation takes her to into the conservative Jewish community in Roseville, NY, where the family of Pessie Goldin are willing to believe that her death in the bathtub was an accident, but her husband thinks she may have been murdered. The story unfolds from the points-of-view of Rebekah and her estranged mother, Aviva, and the personal stakes escalate along with the professional as Rebekah’s investigation progresses. The investigation includes an exploration of religious faith and practice as well as sociological elements that set it apart from other crime fiction. There’s also strong interpersonal elements as Rebekah takes steps to reconnect with her mother that make the novel a compelling family story. This book is likely to appeal to fans of Laura Lippman or Tana French.

Rachel H. / Marathon County Public Library
Find this book in our library catalog.

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