All Who Wander is a fascinating look at the long-term effects of insufficient love, emotional and physical abuse, as well as poor choices in relationships and life in general. Brooke, trapped in a broken family (one that’s missing a mother but has an added stepbrother and an emotionally absent father) and an abusive relationship with her boyfriend, hates her life. When she realizes her lover is likely to kill her, she disappears without a trace. That action colors the lives of her stepbrother, her ex, and her best friend for years to come.
In this introspective domestic psychological suspense with a “true crime” feel, author Clifford peels back layers of the psyches of tortured characters who must deal with not only their personal demons but those left by Brooke’s disappearance. The story is told in alternating points of view between Brooke and her stepbrother Robert Kirby and alternating time lines between the past and the present. Some characters try to overcome past trauma to live a better life “in the sun” while others fall to the dark side.
Though there are some very dark moments in All Who Wander, the book also has some heart-warming scenes in which Robert tries to avoid repeating the child-rearing mistakes his stepfather made. Clifford, as evidenced by this book and by his A Moth to Flame, writes women very well.
All Who Wander is a book you won’t be able to put down.
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All Who Wander (Square Tire Books, September 5, 2023) is available through:
Your local independent bookseller | Amazon | Barnes & Noble
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You can read my reviews of other books by Joe Clifford here:
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