Book Review | The 22 Murders of Madison May by Max Barry

Felicity Staples is a journalist reporting on the shocking murder of real estate agent Madison May. The crime seems random and the suspect is in the wind until she spots him on the subway. While she gave chase, an incident happens and she finds herself in a world where no one remembers Madison May, or her death. She wants to return to her own reality but when another Madison May is murdered, Felicity decides to find the killer and stop him. But she isn’t the only one hunting the killer.

I thought I had time. Another popular line among people who did not, as it turned out, have enough time.

Multiverses and parallel dimensions are some of my favourite sci-fi tropes so the premise of The 22 Murders of Madison May immediately caught my eye. Felicity inadvertently falls into an alternate universe when she is caught up in a chase across space and time. To her horror, she wakes up in a world where everything is almost the same, except for a few differences. The people in her life have the same name but different personalities. Meanwhile, a woman named Madison May keeps getting killed in every world. To solve her problem, Felicity will have to figure out the mystery of Madison May.

I was engrossed at the beginning with the puzzle that Felicity finds herself in. Her situation is actually pretty sad though to say why would be spoiling it. It’s best to discover on your own. It was easy to root for Felicity because she’s resourceful and compassionate even when she’s in trouble. She meets another man, Hugo, who hides a dark secret and together they make a pretty delightful odd couple. I also thought Madison is a great character, and every version of her is compelling and heartbreaking, knowing her fate. Her storylines are framed like different movie genres which I thought was interesting. The ending is poetic and gives her the agency that has been missing throughout the book.

That is one of the issues I had because it wasn’t really fun watching Madison die many times. Especially since we don’t see the aftermath because the timelines keep changing. The alternate universe concept wasn’t explained satisfactorily and was left open. I wanted more emotional depth because Felicity went through pretty awful situations but it was brushed aside at the end. I would have loved this book more if it has a darker psychological take and a more compelling villain instead of a generic serial killer with a flimsy motive. But I still enjoyed the story and it’s a solid addition to the alternate universe sub-genre.

If you love multiverse thrillers like Blake Crouch’s Dark Matter and Stuart Turton’s The Seven Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle, you do not want to miss The 22 Murders of Madison May!

CW: physical violence

I received a copy from the publisher and Netgalley for review purposes.

About the author: Max Barry

Photo by Visual Karsa via Unsplash