Long Bright River

Long Bright River (Jan 2020) is the fourth novel by author Liz Moore. Aside from being a New York Times bestseller, the book has been named as A Best Book of the Year by NPR, Parade, Real Simple, and Buzzfeed. Good Morning America also named it a Book Club Pick. The novel is classified under the categories of Mystery, Thriller & Suspense Literary Fiction and Family Life Fiction. (All page references in this study guide refer to the 2020 Kindle edition of the book.)

Other titles by the same author include The Words of Every Song (2007), Heft (2012), and The Unseen World (2016). Producers Amy Pascal and Neal Moritz have acquired the film rights to Long Bright River, and Moore has been signed to write the screenplay as of 2021.

The words “Long Bright River” are a direct quote from a poem by Alfred Lord Tennyson called “The Lotos-Eaters” (1832). The poem is a retelling of an episode in The Odyssey. When a storm drives Odysseus and his crew off course to the land of the lotus-eaters, the natives tempt some of his men to consume the fruit of the lotus plant. The men fall into a euphoric state that makes them want to remain among the lotus-eaters rather than returning home to Greece. The novel’s title is especially relevant to the issue of drug addiction, which is the principal focus of the book.

The plot of the novel concerns a police officer named Mickey and her efforts to find her missing, drug-addicted sister, Kacey. The story is set in the crime-ridden district of Kensington in present-day Philadelphia. It is told from the first-person perspective of Mickey as she searches for her missing sister at a time when a serial killer is preying on women in the area. Mickey fears that Kacey may be among his victims. The chapters alternate between Mickey’s real-time missing persons investigation and her memories of growing up with her sister in the loveless home of their grandmother. Mickey’s quest to rescue her sister allows the author to examine the themes of toxic families, abuses of police power, and how two girls raised in identical circumstances could make such different life choices.

Plot Summary

Veteran police officer Mickey Fitzpatrick and her rookie partner Lafferty investigate a dead body in the crime-ridden Kensington neighborhood of Philadelphia. Although Lafferty assumes the victim died of a drug overdose, as is common in this area, Mickey notices telltale signs of strangulation, and she refers the case to Homicide. Mickey is relieved that the dead girl isn’t her younger sister, Kacey.

Mickey has vainly been trying to get Kacey off drugs since their early teen years. Their mother died of an overdose, and their father left them in the care of their hard-hearted grandmother. Mickey tries to maintain a close relationship with Kacey, her only real family, but the latter drifts into drugs, and she overdoses for the first time when she is 16. Distraught, Mickey turns to a police officer named Simon for emotional support, and he and Mickey become lovers.

Over the years, Mickey succeeds in buying a home of her own and getting Kacey to kick drugs and move in with her. Shortly after this point, Kacey’s addiction returns, and she conceives a baby with Simon. Concerned about the child, Mickey takes custody and won’t allow Kacey to see her son until she’s off drugs. Kacey fails, and the sisters don’t speak for five years. Kacey’s son, Thomas, is born addicted, and Mickey nurses him through his recovery. She never tells Thomas that Kacey is his real mother.

When three more women die in Kensington, Homicide suspects an active serial killer. Mickey becomes even more worried about Kacey, who has been missing for two months. Mickey conducts her own investigation on the side and learns that her biological father is still alive and that Kacey, now pregnant again, has sought refuge with him. She intends to stay off drugs so that her second child will be born free of addiction.

The sisters reconcile, and Kacey helps Mickey piece together the clues to find the Kensington serial killer, who turns out to be Mickey’s rookie partner, Lafferty. The sisters apprehend the killer and manage to repair their broken relationship. Together, they await the birth of Kacey’s baby daughter.