The Quick Cut: A sixty year old woman wakes up to find she's been committed to the Memory Care Unit of a nursing home with the caretakers saying she won't last the week. All hell breaks loose when she breaks out dedicated to finding out the truth.
A Real Review:
Thank you to St Martin's Press for providing the ARC in exchange for an honest review.
How would you feel if you woke up one day to find the life you had gone? Disappearing like water vapor, the person you are feels like someone 100% different than what everyone else claims. It's like being trapped in a nightmare you can't wake up from. This is the reality that Rose comes to.
Rose is a strong, fierce, yoga-doing, meditating grandmother. That is, until her husband died and everyone in her life watched her quickly deteriorate to the point of requiring care at a nursing home. However, when Rose gets the stomach flu there and ends up throwing up all her meds, a sudden mental clarity hits her along with the new limited reality. When the nursing home staff say that Rose will die within the week, Rose begins a journey to escape the facility and discover the truth of what is happening to her.
My love for Nevada Barr has been a long lasting one: I've been reading her Anna Pigeon series since I was in high school (it's the reason I've been to so many national parks!). She has such a talent to set a stage and slowly unravel a tale. This story continues that legacy with her craft.
Rose is so likeable with ingenuity, drive, and fierceness. It's also impressive how well she could make the various scenarios work while dodging the police and nursing home staff. She has people who care, but that she keeps at an arms length with her independence that put her in a place to be taken advantage of.
It did get a bit slow in the middle, but beyond that - my only complaint is that you do have to uncheck your reality meter on this book. Between the kids involvement, amount of controversy, and the final reveal, it's a tough pill to swallow that this could happen.
An amazing story that requires a creative headspace to believe.
My rating: 4.5 out of 5