Usually when publishers reach out to me with an ARC offer unprompted, they mention why. There’s usually a line in the email that states which book I reviewed favorably that made them think I’ll like this one too. This time, that went unsaid and I didn’t ask. I have no idea what led them to believe Murder Bimbo would be right up my alley, but they were right. The title and description definitely caught my interest. I’ve been craving some good satire, too. However, in today’s climate, I also knew that would be very easy to get wrong. Since this wasn’t an author I was familiar with, it could go either way. I decided to take the risk, and I’m glad I did.

Murder Bimbo by Rebecca Novack publishes this coming Tuesday, February 10th. It will be available everywhere books are sold, including on Bookshop.org

Summary:

A thirty-two year old lesbian sex worker doesn’t question it when agents recruit her to assassinate a dangerous and rising political figure. She thinks she’s the perfect candidate because she has all the skills to get the job done. She realizes too late that she’s actually the perfect candidate because she’s disposable. Once it’s over, she knows she’s next on the hit list and is desperate to save her life. Now, she’s on the run and holed up in a cabin with her laptop. She sends her story in a series of emails to a couple different people who she hopes will listen and maybe help. Each one gets their own version of the story, and the details don’t match.

My Thoughts:

I’ll be honest, I was worried about this one before I started it. Political satire is very tricky in our current atmosphere. Changes are happening so quickly that books run the risk of becoming outdated before even reaching publication. I also knew that while it could be a ton of fun to read through if properly executed, it also had the potential to go off the rails in a terrible way. With satire, there’s rarely space to fall in the middle. That’s especially true when taken to these kinds of extremes. It would be so easy to get this one wrong in today’s culture. Novack pulled it off beautifully.

This is not the book that will help you forget about the anxiety of each new headline. It will remind you of every one of them. It’s littered with graphic on-page common triggers. However, it may still help you cope through feminist rage fantasies. This book had me turning pages, unable to put it down until the early hours of the morning when the words blurred together. I couldn’t get enough.

A large part of that is the extremely engaging voice of the narrator. I found myself hanging on her every word even when I had no sympathy for what she was saying. At some points, it’s even difficult to determine what makes the character so likeable. Still, we really want to see her succeed, and not only because other characters are worse. She’s charismatic enough that you want to believe her even when you know she’s lying. Her razor-sharp wit and bleak sardonic humor help solidify her into the somehow relatable anti-hero she wants to be.

Readers hear three different versions of her story, and the differences are not minor. In fact, despite frequent moments of deja vu, it never feels repetitive. Several times, our narrator even tells us directly that she lied at specific points in her prior tellings. She is proud to be unreliable; she brags about it. She knows the result is an irresistible story (or three of them, depending how you look at). When it was all over and I had turned the final page, I just wanted her to tell it again.

Or perhaps that’s just me. After all, “No one likes bloodthirst unless it mimics their own.”

Content Warnings: Sex Work, SA, Graphic Depictions of Violence, Graphic Sexual Content, Neglect, Toxic Relationships, Stalking, Confinement, Gaslighting, Political Violence, Racism, Misogyny, Emotional Abuse, Infidelity

After I Finished Murder Bimbo

Right now I’m working my way through a beta read that I’m loving, but can’t talk about yet. After that, I have one more ARC that will be coming out this month. This one is another that I’ve been looking forward to. I got it through The Nerd Fam, and several other TNF readers I know have loved it. It’s a dystopian fantasy that I hear has some amazing representation. I can’t wait to dive into it.

My next review will be for This Safe Darkness by Alexis Maragold.