I was first introduced to Liz Moore a few years ago when I devoured The Unseen World, which I noted in my goodreads review from 2017 as “quietly spectacular.” I remember it being a technologically-driven mystery for super smart people, and I often think about the book even today. This novel, The God of the Woods, is an incredibly different type of book. There’s still a mystery involved, but it’s a much more standard type of mystery. Their commonality exists in the fact that both books are extremely well executed by Moore, a human who is obviously very adept at her craft.

Synopsis

The year is 1975, and the head camp counselor at a summer camp located on the Van Laar Preserve wakes to find an empty bunk. To make matters worse, that empty bunk belongs to the daughter of the camp owners and operators, the wealthy Peter and Alice Van Laar, the current rulers of a long-lasting dynasty dripping with wealth and privilege. As investigators, including the green but enthusiastic Judyta Luptack, work tirelessly to find the 17-year-old before the worst can happen, they find themselves uncovering clues to a fourteen-year-old case involving the disappearance of Barbara’s older brother, Bear, only 8 at the time of his disappearance. While the higher-ups believe the case to be wrapped and the culprit identified and long dead, Judyta starts to uncover decades of secrets, lies, and buried injustices that throw everything into question.

Review

This is an ambitious story with so many layers. Under less competent hands, it could easily have become convoluted or too messy to hold the reader’s interest. Moore, however, seems to have found a way for every character to have his or her place in a tapestry that becomes something really beautiful, though profoundly sad in so many ways, which makes for a very satisfying conclusion. Thematically, class and gender play a huge role in the narrative. Alice, the matriarch of the Van Laar family, seeming on the outside to be a trophy wife of privilege, quietly grows smaller under the crushing weight of her powerlessness in her marriage. It’s devastating to see how Alice’s slow erosion of self has affected her relationship with her own daughter, Alice seemingly being incapable of developing any kind of a lasting bond to the person who depends on her the most.

There are far too many vital characters in this book to analyze fully enough to emphasize their importance, and Moore did every one of them justice. There are a couple of characters who deserve no sympathy whatsoever, save for maybe the fact that their upbringing gave them no opportunity for the development of empathy. This is an important aspect of the book, as it speaks to the harm that can come to civilized society when power and wealth is concentrated so wholly with so few.

I’m not sure what else I could say about this book without giving too much away, because it’s a gift that’s worth unwrapping slowly to savor the flood of emotions it inspires. While I don’t think I was as blown away by it as I was with The Unseen World, I still feel the need to rate it five stars for Moore’s unique ability to craft such a powerful story involving so many complex and intriguing characters.

Published July 2, 2024 by Penguin Audio. ISBN 9780008663827. Runtime 14hrs 35mins. Narrated by Saskia Maarleveld.