Review: I Dream of Falling

I Dreamed of Falling by Julia Dahl is a hard book for me to wrap my head around. Dahl can write, she excels at writing about insular communities with plenty of secrets they want to keep buried. It's what kept me going with this book, also the fact that it's a rather short audiobook (8 hours), and y'all, I have to listen to something on my commute. That said, I can't say I really enjoyed this experience.

Roman Grady is the sole reporter for a local newspaper in his small hometown in the Hudson Valley area of New York. A graduate of NYU, he's the type of reporter who once earned a fellowship at the Los Angeles Times, but now he's writing about the dedication of park benches and the hottest news in the area would be someone getting arrested for a DUI. He has a four-year-old son, Mason, with his longtime girlfriend, Ashley, and they live with his mother, Tara, and her fiancé, John, in his childhood home that is falling down around their ears. Then, Ashley goes missing.

Roman finds her at the bottom of a steep ravine at a former friend's house. Dead. There was a party at Bella's house. The three were once close, but as Roman and Ashley settled into a relationship, when Mason came along, Bella's increasingly messy life meant they were no longer truly friends. Roman had no clue Ashley was talking to Bella again, nor that Ashley was using. They find a packet of pills in her pocket and the assumption is she overdosed. It's 2023, they suspect the pills are laced with fentanyl. 

The problem with this story for a long time is that it's more domestic drama than thriller. Ashley's found dead in short order near the start of the book, but then the reader is trapped in an endless cycle reading about miserable people being miserable. Look, I get it. I understood why these characters were miserable, but it doesn't mean I wanted to be trapped in their heads reading about their misery either.

Ashley and Roman met in middle school and quickly formed a bond. As they got older it was clear they loved each other, but they had an open relationship (and still do - despite Mason coming along, these two are still hooking up with other people). It was all going great guns until Ashley ends up pregnant and Roman defers his fellowship to the LA Times. Then the pandemic hits, Ashley has to give birth to Mason alone in the hospital, nearly dies, and falls into postpartum depression. Tara steps in, determined to be Super Grandma because she was certainly no Mother of the Year when Roman was growing up. That creates a push-pull between Ashley and Tara over Mason's care and affection (the kid is four, plenty of love to go around yo) and meanwhile Roman is feeling increasingly trapped by his job and obligations but has zero momentum or drive to do something about it. Tara, of course, is the I Know Best Grandmother, her and Ashley clash over pandemic restrictions, and the house they live in is in desperate need of repair, which John is working on, but all this costs money and it's a lot. 

Finally, FINALLY, over halfway through the book, the What Happened To Ashley question finally starts to cook - and we get to the ending. Dahl does a good job of leading readers down various blind alleys but ultimately the question of who killed Ashley is completely wrapped up in all these miserable characters being miserable and not unpacking their trauma. And Roman? This guy y'all. I desperately wanted him to leave behind scorched Earth at the end. Lord knows the denouement warrants it. Instead I'm convinced he chooses the path he does because it's easier for him. It saves him from having to man up, find his stones, and take it all on himself like a frickin' grown up.

Dahl can write, but man I didn't like these people and wanted to punt them into the sun.

Final Grade = C-