The Crying Tree is about what happens to a close knit family when their son Shep Stanley is shot and killed in their home during a botched burglary attempt. After his death, Irene (his mother), Nate (his father) and younger sister Bliss are forced to deal not only with Shep's death, but their feelings of hatred towards the person who supposedly shot him. This book is written mainly from Irene's viewpoint. Eventually, after a self-destructive phase, Irene comes to realize that the murderer is not what he seems after she decides to write to him. Irene finds out the murderer has some secrets of his own that will impact Irene's family forever.


This book started out great. I loved the short chapters. Also, I liked the forgiveness theme of Irene's character. The author also done a wonderful job telling the story from a grieving mother's prospective. Though, overall, I thought that the big "secret" of the plot was a bit predictable & a little goofy. The characters were somewhat stereotypical. Especially, the religious characters were all written very stereotypical and very unflatteringly so. I also thought the book got a bit preachy towards the end.

Also, if you are conservative about foul language and/or sexual themes, you might want to skip this one. There is no shortage of foul language and some sexual themes are acted out or talked about.

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Sad book, but really pulls the effects society has on people who are different into perspective.

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