Down the Rabbit Hole audiobook

For reasons I can't fully articulate, the Echo Falls mystery series has become a favorite of mine. Stephen King calls it "astonishing." Some readers complain that "the outcome is obvious," failing to understand that this is a story of suspense--one appropriate for the age-level of its audience. (We so desperately need juvenile/young adult books that are neither horrifying or depressing)!The main character is present when a murder occurs. She tries to solve it before the police accuse her of the crime or the murderer discovers what she's doing. While she's focused on these problems, she is blind to the problems taking place in her family. Still loving the book on my third read.

When I think about the writing of Peter Abrahams, I’m reminded of something the late film critic Roger Ebert said about actor Michael Keaton: “Michael Keaton is a fast-talking actor, who may be the best in the business at showing you how fast he can think. He projects smartness, he sees all the angles, he sizes up a situation and acts on it while another actor might still be straightening his tie. … He knows he’s right, he knows he’s late, he knows what he has to do, and he’ll explain everything later.”I thought about that while reading DOWN THE RABBIT HOLE, Abrahams’ first novel for children. Ingrid Levin-Hill may be thirteen, and dealing with mundane things like braces and soccer and a first stumbling romance and an annoying older brother, but in many ways she’s a typical Abrahams character who stumbles up against murder and finds herself deciding, even before she understands why, that it’s best that she keeps her mouth shut about what she knows because some primal instinct tells her that she’s uniquely qualified to solve the mystery. And it’s not just because she’s an admirer of Sherlock Holmes’ methods of detection; it’s just something she knows about herself. Before she really knows it. Like Abrahams himself, Ingrid bristles with intelligence beneath her placid surface, and even as events seem to sprinting ahead of her, she catches herself catching up to them, often with a bit of Holmesian wisdom — “The more bizarre a thing is the less mysterious it proves to be. It is your commonplace, featureless crimes which are really puzzling, just as commonplace face is the most difficult to identify” — married to her own feral, free-range intelligence. As a result, interesting things are happening around her, often because she acts on instinct, and the product of those instincts — reckless and haphazard as they seem at the time — have a chemically catalytic effect on the plot, and keep things moving even they might appear to be standing still. The plot? Ingrid, racing to make it to soccer practice, gets turned around in her hometown of Echo Falls, Connecticut, and winds up at the house of the town eccentric, “Cracked-Up Katie.” Katie takes her in out of the rain, lets her call for a cab, and the next day Ingrid learns a) that Katie has been murdered; and b) that she left her soccer cleats behind in Katie’s house. And in the course of dealing with ‘b,” Ingrid gets a little too invested in “a.” And, with that, the game’s afoot.DOWN THE RABBIT HOLE, the first of three Ingrid Levin-Hill novels, isn’t perfect. I’ll be honest: as much of an admirer I am of Abrahams, coherent plotting isn’t his strongest point. And I was more aware than I would have liked that Ingrid doesn’t seem to have age-appropriate reactions to death and things death-adjacent. People get seriously hurt because of things Ingrid has instigated in her haphazard investigation, and she has much to feel guilty about, only she doesn’t seem to feel bad or guilty about much of that, because, I’m guessing, that would interfere with the lightly jocular tone of this middle-grade novel. But what Abrahams does, he does better than just about anybody in the crime-fiction game. One: More than almost any author I know, his stories are infused with a smooth, almost seamless sense of glide, of sentences that slip into one another like velvet gloves onto manicured hands, even as things—events and realizations—bump into one another beneath the surface of the prose. And two: Abrahams is the undisputed master of off-the-nose prose. No character in an Abrahams novel ever says anything directly; and their evasions are so smooth that the other characters take a while to catch up to what they’re really saying. They almost never say yes or no, or exposit anything in reply to an inquiry; they’re constantly saying things like “In a manner of speaking” or “Something like that” or “Nothing worth mentioning” or “Oh, here and there. Various places.” These bits are delicious in the moment, and even more delicious later when the Ingrids of Abrahams’ works realize the secrets those characters are protecting with their evasions. Secrets that they are often willing to kill in order to protect, usually with no small degree of dark theatricality. And the Ingrids of the world are uniquely well-positioned to expose them because they too are masters of the evasion game, and Ingrid in particular is a particularly smooth liar, even as the weight of those lies — to her parents, her friends, the police chief — pile up higher and heavier than a thirteen-year-old girl can reach, or carry.Another thing Abrahams does well here is plant series-arc seeds: What explain the pockets of cold between Ingrid’s over-striving parents? Why are they so determined to make “Grampy” sell off a piece of his farmland, and why os Grampy so determined to resist? Why is Ty, Ingrid’s brother, so quick to anger? What will happy between Ingrid and Joey, the police chief’s son? Like all good mysteries, all will be revealed in due course. And so I’m on to the next Ingrid Levin-Hill mystery, and I’m on to the next story about a thirteen-year-old girl, as a man in late middle age, because the writing and sentence-by-sentence storytelling is good that I cannot resist it.

I read a lot of cozy mysteries, and I was not expecting a middle-grade novel to be a perfectly formed (and quite dark) cozy in the classic style. But it is, and it's delightful. The prose sparkles. The mystery itself would not be the least bit out of place in an adult novel but the twelve-year-old protagonist approaches it in a way that perfectly fits her circumstances, and there's plenty of setup to draw on for sequels. Which I will be reading immediately.

I have to thank my brother for introducing me to this book. Cover to cover, it was a delight to read. The characters were so well written and likable. The story unfolded at a perfect pace and left no questions unanswered. I will definitely be reading the rest of the Echo Falls series.

The book was really entertaining and I really liked it. The dialogue was kind of stupid, being the response was usually awkward and "yeah". I liked how the mystery was really hidden and under the wraps and such. But I didn't like how a lot of the information they give you in the book didn't really matter. Also, the ending was rushed. They cleared everything up, but not very good or in much detail. If it wasn't for the fact I was so entertained through the book to notice any of these wrongs until now, as I think about it. It is a good book to read on a lazy day where you aren't reading the book for any action, since the book kind of goes off topic throughout the whole thing. Also the man character, Ingrid, is that go-to-main-character. The one that is athletic, popular, yet has the littlest quirks that are forgotten throughout the books that makes her not that unique. Her personality is really hard to spot and for a person looking for a book they want to sit down and love, this is not the book for you. This is more like the book you can stand through, understand, and finish quickly without much deep thought. But, I still plan to read the rest of the series.

For someone who counts The Westing Game among their favorite books, I haven't made much of an effort to seek out other YA mysteries. That will now change.This one is pretty good. The bad guy is pretty obvious from the start of the book, but Ingrid's hunt is fun enough that it doesn't matter. She's a great protagonist, and there's plenty of middle school and family intrigue that keeps the book moving. Entertaining for fans of YA, no matter how old they are.

This was a very fun young adult (just barely out of middle grade) book! The plot was interesting and the characters were fun. Abrahams captures the thought pattern of a 13 year old really well and it felt super genuine. I will definitely be reading more of this series.

a adolescent classic whose target audience is me and croepke specifically... but everyone else read this too please I wanna talk about it

Good murder mystery with a great surprise ending. Ingrid is quite the girl.

In Peter Abrahams’s novel, Down The Rabbit Hole, you will be pleasantly surprised by the way the author skillfully builds suspense in this American cozy. Growing up in what appears to be a typical middle-class environment, Ingrid Levin-Hill is thirteen years old, lives at 99 Maple Lane, in Echo Falls, Connecticut, attends Ferrand Middle School, and is on track to attend an Ivy League college, like Princeton, presumably, if she can keep up her grades in math – Algebra 2. She wears braces on her teeth, visits Dr. Bickerman, her orthodontist, and now wears an “appliance” or retainer in her mouth when she goes to bed. Although, there are times when she forgets to wear the appliance. Her father is a financial adviser for the Ferrand Group – he is forever reading the Wall Street Journal at the kitchen table while eating breakfast – and her mother is a real estate agent. Her brother Ty is a freshman at high school and is a jock, playing defensive back on the varsity football team. She has several girlfriends – Stacey Rubino, and Mia McGreevy, whom she meets every weekday on the school bus, and a budding friendship with Joey Strade, the son of Gilbert L. Strade, the chief of police. In this American cozy, Echo Falls mystery, Ingrid, an aficionado of Sherlock Holmes – on her night table beside her bed is a copy of Sir Canon Doyle’s book: The Complete Sherlock Holmes - finds herself somewhat intrigued and compelled to solve the murder of Katherine Kovacs, also known around town as “Cracked-Up Katie.” She had met Katherine moments before her death, having been invited into her house to sit while she called for a taxicab for her young friend. When Ingrid inadvertently leaves behind her red Pumas with red cleats at Katherine’s house and then discovers that Cracked-Up Katie had been murdered, she realizes that she must go back to the house and retrieve her red Pumas. Slipping through the basement window, Ingrid, metaphorically, falls “down the rabbit hole.” Throughout the narrative, you will enjoy the literary and film allusion to Alice in Wonderland, Dial M for Murder, The Hounds of the Baskervilles, Casablanca, The Producers, and several others. You will find the conflict between Ingrid and Chief Strade to be more than a little interesting, especially, after he begins to suspect that she knows more than what she is telling or is somehow involved in the murder of Katherine Kovacs. The history of the Prescotts – especially, Philip Prescott, and his affair with Katherine, and his sudden disappearance, running off to Alaska under dubious circumstances – and Katherine’s relationship to David Vardack and Vincent Dun will have you pondering possible scenarios. Ingrid’s audition for the play Alice in Wonderland is rather amusing. Her crisp and concise dialogue with Joey and her online communications with her girlfriends, Stacey and Mia, using text abbreviations, symbols, and phrases, instead of complete sentences, thoughtfully reflect how text communications has altered the way students, children, and young adults communicate with one another in this age of cyberspace, cybercafes, cybercitizens, and will have you debating the pros and cons of text messaging. Nevertheless, you will be pleased with the resolution of the narrative, the build up of suspense, and intensity of the action, as Ingrid comes to solve the mystery. I highly recommend this book to all readers – young and adult readers alike. I look forward to reading other stories from this best-selling author – Peter Abrahams – including A PERFECT CRIME, THE TUTOR, THE FAN, and LIGHTS OUT, for which he received an Edgar Award nomination.