Unbecoming (Scherm) - Book Reviews

Book Reviews
[S]artlingly inventive…Scherm's narrative technique can be disorienting: She's devoted to flashbacks and flash forwards, resists revelations and teases information from a scene. But her deliberately convoluted style suits Grace's elusive nature and that of all the other dissemblers in this story…As for Grace herself, she's a real work of art—even if she is a fake
Marilyn Stasio - New York Times


Scherm’s voice is gutsy.... She shows she has the chops to produce something delightfully wicked.
Chicago Tribune


Scherm has elevated the heist novel beyond entertainment. Like a painting that becomes more intriguing the longer you study it, Unbecoming is a genuine work of art.
Minneapolis Star-Tribune


This lively debut combines a knotty coming-of-age tale and a high-society caper. . . . Scherm is at her best when she is parsing the fumblings of a young woman trying to devise a persona in the world.
New Yorker


Intricately detailed and rich with art and deception, Scherm’s debut is a treat.
People


Scherm’s pulse-quickening debut follows crafty Grace as she flees a love triangle and a heist gone awry, leaving her husband and a friend—a man she secretly loves—to take the rap.
O Magazine


A clever, engrossing thriller . . . You won’t want to stop until you’ve turned the last page.
]Huffington Post


[T]he transformation of a smalltown American girl into a professional international jewel thief.... Scherm mixes a character study with a caper novel full of double-crosses, lies, and betrayals.... She is at her best when describing precious objects...ignored by their owners but appreciated by the professional hired to evaluate them.
Publishers Weekly


Scherm's debut has a plot that twists and turns, but it is the enigma of who Grace really is that will keep readers hooked until the very end. A bleak tone, deeply flawed protagonist, and dysfunctional relationships will draw well-deserved comparisons to Gillian Flynn. —Portia Kapraun, Monticello-Union Twp. P.L., IN
Library Journal


A small-town Tennessee girl flourishes into a classic, yet never cliché, femme fatale in Rebecca Scherm’s provocative coming-of-age debut.... With a well-researched plot and illuminating prose, Unbecoming is an atmospheric adventure from start to finish.
BookPage


More thrills and less ponderous thinking about thrills would have made this an impressive first novel. Instead, it's a decidedly mixed bag, taking too long to gather the momentum it needs to succeed as crime fiction and not quite making the cut as satisfying literary fiction, either.
Kirkus Reviews