Book Review: The Life We Bury

 

The Life We Bury, published in 2014, is a crime/mystery/suspense novel, and the first book by lawyer-turned-author Allen Eskens. The plot is set in Minnesota, where Eskens went to school and practiced law, so if you are familiar with the state, you will recognize many of the locations he mentions. The story involves a college student named Joe Talbert, who has to write a biography for a college English assignment. He ends up interviewing a man named Carl Iverson, who spent 30 years in prison for murdering his teenage neighbor back in 1980 (which he claims he did not commit), and was medically paroled to a nursing home because of terminal cancer. Talbert begins to suspect that Iverson is telling the truth and, with the help of his neighbor Lilah Nash, sets out to try to get the investigation into the murder reopened. 

The novel is 300 pages long and the physical book was only released in paperback. While the murder investigation is the main plotline of the novel, there are several side plots, mostly centered on the lives of Talbert and Nash, and on fleshing out Iverson's life before he was arrested for murder. The story is very engaging, and the story flows very well. Eskens does a good job of making the legal parts of the story accurate without bogging it down with legalese. He includes just enough legal concepts to explain things while making it easy for non-lawyers to follow. He also does a very good job navigating between the various storylines and blending drama and suspense with some action and romance. Ultimately, it is a book with a very engaging story that makes it hard to put down. It is absolutely worth reading for anyone who is a fan of crime mysteries.