Title: We Begin at the End

Author: Chris Whitaker

Publisher: Henry Holt and Co. 2021

Genre: Fiction

Pages: 368

Rating: 2/5 stars

Reading Challenges:

Duchess Day Radley is a thirteen-year-old self-proclaimed outlaw. Rules are for other people. She is the fierce protector of her five-year-old brother, Robin, and the parent to her mother, Star, a single mom incapable of taking care of herself, let alone her two kids.

Walk has never left the coastal California town where he and Star grew up. He may have become the chief of police, but he’s still trying to heal the old wound of having given the testimony that sent his best friend, Vincent King, to prison decades before. And he's in overdrive protecting Duchess and her brother.

Now, thirty years later, Vincent is being released. And Duchess and Walk must face the trouble that comes with his return.

I just really disliked this book. We (mostly everyone else) picked this one as a book club book. Almost immediately, I knew that this would not be the book for me. I really dislike books that focus on tragic lives. Those books where everything is just so bleak. I really struggle to get into those types of books. I often find that there are no likable characters or at least none that I can really root for. Everyone is just so desperate. That is this book. The random seeming twists to the plot did not do me any favors in connecting to the story and characters. And I thoroughly disliked Duchess. She did not talk or act like a 13 year old. At times, she was very much like a child of 8 and at other times she was too adult. She very much annoyed me. And if I have to hear someone refer to themselves as an “outlaw” more time, I might scream.

Next up on the TBR pile: