Suspect Red, by L.M. Elliott

I was very excited to come across this book - you know how I love historical fiction! - and I had never seen nor heard of this book before! After my last book not being one I was willing to finish, I looked forward to a book more to my liking, at least potentially.

Suspect Red takes place over several years in the 1950's in the U.S., when fear was being flamed like a giant forest fire across the nation, based on world events both recent and current.  In short, thousands of people's lives were turned upside down because of the fear mongering and bigotry being encouraged - by people from the upper levels of  government to those in everyday homes and communities.

On the positive side, this book is full of really interesting information about this dark period in our nation's history. There is a lot to learn here, both factually and in lessons learned, and many of the events can be compared to our nation's current climate - perhaps the best reason to give this book a try. However, I feel like Elliott missed the mark. It often felt like she had so much information she wanted to include that her characters were verbalizing events and details outside of what her characters would have actually thought or said. Several times I was wishing Steve Sheinkin was doing the writing, because I think he would have done better creating believable characters and scenarios from this era. Elliott makes a decent book of it, but not a great one...and it had the potential to be a great one.

If you love U.S. history you may like this book. If you don't, or do but only a little, I think it may be tough to keep interest until the end. The characters and scenes are just not developed well enough to make you finish the book, in my opinion. 3 paws.