The Sun Down Motel by Simone St. James Series: Fell, New York #1
Published by Berkley on February 18 2020
Genres: Adult, Horror, Mystery
Pages: 327
Format: Finished paperback
Source: Purchased
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The nitty-gritty: Welcome to Fell, New York, a town with many unsolved mysteries and plenty of ghosts. The Sun Down Motel has a room waiting for you, if you’re brave enough to enter…
I’m so glad I finally made time to read The Sun Down Motel, after diving into Simone St. James’s A Box Full of Darkness earlier this year, which is technically a sequel to this book. I really enjoyed it, but I think I would have loved it even more if I’d read it back in 2020 when it was released. The Sun Down Motel didn’t hit me emotionally the way A Box Full of Darkness did, which is probably why I’m only giving it four stars. But honestly, this is such a good supernatural mystery, and readers who love complex puzzles with a side helping of ghosts will have a fun time.
The story is told in two timelines and takes place in Fell, New York, a very creepy little town where people seem to go missing and die with unsettling frequency. The first timeline takes place in 1982 where we meet Vivian Delaney, a young woman who was planning on moving to New York City to be an actress but was sidetracked when she ended up in Fell. Viv stumbles upon the Sun Down Motel, a seedy, badly lit motel that promises to be cheap—Viv barely has any money. Right away, she notices all sorts of strange things. Hotel room doors open and shut by themselves, the lights flicker on and off, and Viv can smell cigarette smoke even though there isn’t a smoker anywhere to be seen. When she hears rumors about some local girls whose bodies were found dumped in various places around town, she decides to investigate and finds some interesting connections between the dead girls and a frequent guest at the motel.
In alternating chapters taking place in 2017, we follow twenty-year old Carly Kirk. Carly’s aunt Viv went missing thirty-five years ago, and her body was never found. Carly has been obsessed with the mystery for years, and after her mother dies, she decides to go to Fell to see if she can dig up some answers.
Little by little, the two storylines reveal what’s going on with the murdered girls and what happened to Viv. This is a slow-build mystery that does a great job of building tension, and Viv and Carly both turn out to be very talented sleuths, using resources like the library (Carly has to use the microfiche machine, which brought back memories!), old letters and journals. Viv in particular was such a great character, a single woman in the 1980s who is trying to buck tradition and do her own thing. When she encounters the Sun Down, her life takes a dramatic turn, and she’s forced to confront things like ghosts, drug dealers and a married woman having an affair at the motel. Her curiosity gets her in trouble at times, but she never gives up her search to bring justice to the young girls whose murders were never solved.
I also loved that Carly wanted to retrace Viv’s footsteps in order to find her. She visits Viv’s old apartment building, only to discover that a girl named Heather is living there and looking for a roommate. Carly moves in, and she and Heather not only become good friends, but end up working together to crack Viv’s cold case.
There are a bunch of other side characters, all of whom slot nicely into the story. Marnie is a photographer who was hired to spy on someone at the motel (whose photos play a part in solving the crimes), and Alma, the night shift cop who responds to a call from Viv one night, ends up helping fill in some blanks. Some of the characters cross over into both time lines, which was interesting and well done.
And while the mystery was a lot of fun, it was the overall vibe of the book that won me over. St. James is a master of atmospheric stories, and here the real star of the show is the Sun Down Motel, which takes on a life of its own. Both Viv and Carly experience first hand the ghosts who are haunting the motel, and the hotel itself, even without ghosts, is pretty creepy. There’s an empty swimming pool full of debris and leaves, closed after a deadly accident. The flickering “Vacancy” sign takes on an ominous tone early in the story. And the room doors that mysterious open all at once gave me the chills! Even in 2017, the motel is stuck in the past, with only a landline phone, no computers and old fashioned door keys. The story, for me, had a wonderful Hitchcockian feel, and I could picture the whole thing as an old, black and white movie. I almost wonder what the story would have been like if the author had switched the timelines to the 1950s/1980s instead.
My only complaint is the ending, which was sort of depressing, to be honest. Viv’s story didn’t turn out the way I had hoped. I was also expecting more epic twists, which never really materialized. But these are very minor complaints. I am hoping Simone St. James plans on visiting Fell again, I just can’t get enough of this creepy town. If you haven’t read The Sun Down Motel and you’re looking for a spooky mystery, this is the one to grab!
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