Cartwheel (duBois) - Book Reviews

Book Reviews
[T]he interests of Cartwheel are overwhelmingly literary. Events in the novel are not recounted as newsworthy in themselves, best delivered untouched; rather, DuBois wrings them for that which is universally (or at least culturally) meaningful. She uses the given story, in other words, as a thematic test case: How could a well-intentioned girl—a girl like your daughter or mine—end up looking so guilty of murder, leading millions to believe the charges? How does our American blitheness, the growing sexual confidence of (some of) our young women, the openness of speech and behavior, operate out of context? When is naïveté a kind of crime? And how is a parent implicated by a child who commits such a crime?…The writing in Cartwheel is a pleasure—electric, fine-tuned, intelligent, conflicted. The novel is engrossing, and its portraiture hits delightfully and necessarily close to home.
Amity Gaige - New York Times Book Review


A convincing, compelling tale.... The story plays out in all its well-told complexity.
New York Daily News


Something more provocative, meaningful and suspenseful than the tabloids and social media could provide.... [DuBois] tells a great story.... The power of Cartwheel resides in duBois’ talent for understanding how the foreign world can illuminate the most deeply held secrets we keep from others, and ourselves.
Chicago Tribune


A smart, literary thriller [for] fans of Gillian Flynn’s Gone Girl.
Huffington Post

 
[You’ll] break your own record of pages read per minute as you tear through this book.
Marie Claire
 

[A] gripping, gorgeously written novel.... The emotional intelligence in Cartwheel is so sharp it’s almost ruthless—a tabloid tragedy elevated to high art.
Entertainment Weekly


Taking themes that were “loosely inspired by the story of Amanda Knox,” Cartwheel follows American exchange student Lily Hayes, who has been accused of murdering her roommate.... While muddying the waters of right and wrong is almost always a valiant cause in literature, this novel reads more like an intellectual exercise in examining all the different angles rather than an emotional engagement with human beings.
Publishers Weekly


(Starred review.) [DuBois] does an excellent job of creating and maintaining a pervasive feeling of foreboding and suspense.... An acute psychological study of character that rises to the level of the philosophica.... Cartwheel is very much its own individual work of the author’s creative imagination.
Booklist


Attempts to cannibalize Amanda [Knox's] story....Lily herself is a not very interesting addition to those thousands of young Americans looking to spread their wings in an exotic locale. Readers are meant to presume her innocence while retaining a tiny sliver of doubt.... A tangled tale that leaves protagonist Lily, and the crime, unilluminated.
Kirkus Reviews