We Begin at the End
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4.2 • 99 Ratings
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- $16.99
Publisher Description
Winner of the Gold Dagger for Best Crime Novel from the Crime Writers’ Association (UK)
Winner for Best International Crime Fiction from Australian Crime Writers Association
An Instant New York Times Bestseller
“A vibrant, engrossing, unputdownable thriller that packs a serious emotional punch. One of those rare books that surprise you along the way and then linger in your mind long after you have finished it.”
—Kristin Hannah, #1 New York Times bestselling author of The Nightingale and The Four Winds
Right. Wrong. Life is lived somewhere in between.
Duchess Day Radley is a thirteen-year-old self-proclaimed outlaw. Rules are for other people. She is the fierce protector of her five-year-old brother, Robin, and the parent to her mother, Star, a single mom incapable of taking care of herself, let alone her two kids.
Walk has never left the coastal California town where he and Star grew up. He may have become the chief of police, but he’s still trying to heal the old wound of having given the testimony that sent his best friend, Vincent King, to prison decades before. And he's in overdrive protecting Duchess and her brother.
Now, thirty years later, Vincent is being released. And Duchess and Walk must face the trouble that comes with his return. We Begin at the End is an extraordinary novel about two kinds of families—the ones we are born into and the ones we create.
APPLE BOOKS REVIEW
Life isn’t fair. Chris Whitaker’s intimate novel makes that common bit of folk wisdom feel absolutely poetic. The story itself is beautifully simple: A rebellious 13-year-old girl named Duchess and a guilt-ridden small-town police chief form an unexpected bond over a 30-year-old crime. Both of these unforgettable characters want nothing more than to protect the people they love from further pain. Whitaker sensitively captures the experiences of struggling individuals for whom happiness can be as fleeting as a sunset. We were particularly taken by the way Duchess deals with all the emotional weight on her shoulders by imagining herself as a Wild West outlaw. Whitaker’s young heroine reminded us of iconic fictional figures like Jo March and Scout Finch. And yes, We Begin at the End is that good.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Set largely in 2005, this superb thriller from Whitaker (Tall Oaks) examines the repercussions of a fatal accident decades earlier on the residents of Cape Haven, a tourist town on the California coast. At 15, Vincent King was sent to a men's prison for hitting and killing seven-year-old Sissy Radley while joyriding. Now, 30 years later, Vincent is being released. His childhood friend, Walker—Cape Haven's police chief—hopes that Vincent, and the town, can finally begin healing. But soon after Vincent's return, Star Radley—a single mother and Sissy's older sister—is found murdered in her home. With Vincent as the prime suspect, Chief Walker and Duchess, Star's 13-year-old daughter and self-proclaimed outlaw, each launch their respective quests for the truth. Powered by extraordinarily deep character development and an impressively intricate plot, this novel is simultaneously a murder mystery, a love story, and a heartbreaking tragedy. The existential agony is palpable throughout, but so, too, is the hope at the end. Whitaker has upped his game with this emotionally charged page-turner.
Customer Reviews
Epic
What an awesome book
It’s a bit long, but just excellent
Just got weird
There was a lot I did like about the novel, such as intelligence in the writing, and the fact that I didn’t know “who dun it” until the very end, but I also, in equal parts, didn’t like a lot.
Duchess is an awful character and I’m sorry but having taught hs for 30 years, I can safely say I know the various ways kids talk and this kid was just the author’s own imagination- no reality. She was also so unlikable.
But that aside I was into the story until it devolved into a convoluted mess of who did what to whom and the whys etc.