When Kate Aitken is hired, sight unseen, to catalog the papers of a famous photographer, the late Miranda Brand, she is at first thrilled at the opportunity. Kate --- desperate to escape her life in New York City and the professional scandal that abruptly ended her career as a journalist --- is eager for a fresh start, a chance to impose order on chaos. However, little does she realize the extent to which her archivist training will be put to the test when she arrives in California and sets eyes on Miranda’s papers, perhaps more accurately described as a trash pile.
 
Miranda’s son, Theo, is living in his childhood home with his two young children for the summer, overseeing the archiving process while preparing to sell off his family’s estate. At first, Kate finds Theo deeply off-putting, even creepy, and starts to half-believe the rumors that Theo --- who would have been a preteen at the time --- might have had something to do with his mother’s death by gunshot. He seems peculiarly secretive, destroying his mother’s valuable artwork and forbidding Kate to ask questions or explore some areas of the house.

"TAKE ME APART is a promising debut that will leave readers eager to see how Sligar continues to grow as a writer."

But as Kate begins to piece together Miranda’s personal and professional life histories, her journalistic instincts kick in, and she can’t avoid starting her own investigation into Miranda’s death. She risks upending the carefully constructed façade of perfection enjoyed by the residents of Miranda’s picture-perfect Northern California town --- her own aunt and uncle included. As she spends more time with Theo and his young family, Kate starts to wonder where the truth resides --- although Miranda’s story might also force her to confront her own uncomfortable past.
 
Sara Sligar’s first thriller is cleverly constructed, as she intersperses Kate’s present-day investigation with snippets of archival materials, including letters, receipts and passages from Miranda’s journals. Readers will begin to feel something like archivists or detectives themselves as they help to piece together the fragments of the deceased artist’s life.
 
This narrative structure is an effective way to convey the story, which unfolds suspensefully. Unfortunately, neither Kate’s mysterious backstory nor the true circumstances of Miranda’s death quite live up to the buildup that the author creates. Sligar capably illustrates the challenges that creative women contend with, but also seems intent on tying both plotlines into the current #MeToo discourse. Although the stories she tells do resonate in some ways with these very real concerns, ultimately the narrative falls short of any sort of overarching thematic clarity.

Overall, however, TAKE ME APART is a promising debut that will leave readers eager to see how Sligar continues to grow as a writer.