The Collective: A Novel

Was waiting for this book to be released for several months after hearing about the description. Ended up buying on day one and was not disappointed!

Five stars and would give more if I could.

Emily Gardner has spent years mourning the loss of her daughter to a boy who ended up getting away with the crime. Her life has been unraveled causing divorce and a deep depression which she battles with medication. Until she meets a group of like minded women via the dark web who give their own brand of vigilante justice.

What follows is a amazing, dark, beautifully written, superbly paced book that I could not stop reading. Just so good....... And the ending is just awesome and brutal. I thought I had it figured it out but only was way wrong. After the ending I thought about it for a long time.

Five stars way up and I'm so glad I discovered Alison Gaylin and can't wait to read another book by her.

"𝑻𝒉𝒆 𝒉𝒖𝒓𝒕'𝒔 𝒕𝒉𝒆 𝒔𝒂𝒎𝒆. 𝑻𝒉𝒆 𝒘𝒐𝒖𝒏𝒅 𝒏𝒆𝒗𝒆𝒓 𝒉𝒆𝒂𝒍𝒔. 𝑻𝒉𝒆 𝒅𝒆𝒕𝒂𝒊𝒍𝒔 𝒏𝒆𝒗𝒆𝒓 𝒇𝒂𝒅𝒆." 𝕋𝕙𝕖 ℂ𝕠𝕝𝕝𝕖𝕔𝕥𝕚𝕧𝕖 - Aᴸᴵsᴼᴺ Gᴬʸᴸᴵᴺ ⭐ ( 7.5 / 10 ) The first rule of fight- I mean the Collective we don't talk about The Collective and the second rule of The Collective... Don't tell ANYONE about The Collective. The consequences are severe. I loved this book. It was so slow. Lord it was slow. There were definitely bits and pieces of this book that could have been left out and got me a little lost amongst the details. You know when you have scenes that are great and then the next scene theres a bunch of unnecessary stuff so you try to read the page six times ( I did not do that I just passed on by) but that's what I mean. There weren't a lot of those but there were a couple. It obviously didn't take away from the book for me as I finished it and still loved it. There were a few unnecessary characters that honestly don't make sense until the last 20 pages and I'm still ok with that! I loved the way the tasks were slow-rolled out. I would get just as frustrated (in a good way) as the characters in the story. I laughed I cried I shook my head. It was great. Still slow though. Anyway, this book is mostly about grief and not just any grief. The grief of a parent who's child had been murdered and the justice system didn't bring justice. Who is 0001 was there ever really a 1219? Was there ever more than just 0001 and 0419? It doesn't make sense if you haven't read it so read it! Consequences. Right and wrong. I honestly don't know what I would do if I were Camille, but like I said... We don't talk about the Collective. 𝕊𝕚𝕝𝕖𝕟𝕥 ℝ𝕖𝕒𝕕𝕚𝕟𝕘 𝘑𝘢𝘺 𝘔𝘢𝘺 𝘖𝘶𝘵

I guess you got to really know what you're doing when you go on the dark web? Becarful what you ask for?

Intriguing story. Very similar to The Chain (sorry but I liked the Chain better). Group of grieving woman out to get revenge for their loved ones deaths. When the system fails them, they take matters into their own hands. Camille tried to get out and tried to stay on top of it but in the end, they got to her first. Sad ending. Identity for 0001 was predictable. I did overall enjoy it.

The ending lost me. Without spoiling it, I just couldn't connect with the conclusion. It started losing its flavor toward the middle, but I held hope it would reestablish itself in the finale scene, but... it didn't. At least not for me.