Keep It in the Family by John Marrs

 

This is the first book I've read by John Marrs. It wasn't terrible, but the story just didn't grab me. I didn't really like jumping back and forth from decades ago to current day. Combine that with different narrators and mystery narrators, it's just a lot to keep up with. It felt like the only reason it was somewhat suspenseful was due to the fact the story was told in such a confusing way. The end tried to have a few twists but I feel like I saw all of them coming.

This story is about the Hunter family and their crimes. Debbie and her brother George Hunter grew up in a family where their parents often lured young children to the house and killed them. When Debbie's father realized his wife might try to kill George, he sent George to a remote town in Norway for safety, unbeknownst to Debbie, who thought George was dead. Debbie married at age 16, with her grandparents support, to another 16 year old named Dave, who also had a bad upbringing. In the meanwhile, Debbie's grandparents killed her parents after learning what they had been doing (killing children). Debbie and Dave became very close and eventually, Dave became accustomed to help cover up Debbie's crimes as she became more and more insatiable. Eventually, Dave senses that their son (Finn) and ex-daughter-in-law (Mia) are about to uncover the truth, so he decided to commit suicide and tried to put all the blame (of the killings) on himself to spare Debbie from getting in trouble. Unfortunately, the detective was detailed and started having doubts with Dave's confession, which triggered Finn and Mia to look into it further themselves. They discovered that Finn is not the biological child of Debbie and Dave - he's just another abductee whose life was spared. George reconnects with Debbie after seeing her on TV, and believed Debbie's lies, who told him it was Dave that committed the crimes and Debbie was an innocent victim in an abusive relationship. Debbie realizes the net is closing in on her, so she abducts Finn and Mia's son, Sonny, to control Finn and Mia. She secretly sends Sonny to George, who thought he was helping Debbie. Debbie is sent to the psychiatric hospital for her crimes. Finn hires a private investigator and finds where Sonny is. Finn and Mia reunite with Sonny, and Finn kills George even though George didn't have any ill intentions. Finn and Mia are back together, but Mia doesn't know that Finn has been murdering people and grooming Sonny just like Debbie did to him when he was Sonny's age.