Synopsis:
Lo Denham is used to being on her own. After her parents died, Lo’s sister, Bea, joined The Unity Project, leaving Lo in the care of their great aunt. Thanks to its extensive charitable work and community outreach, The Unity Project has won the hearts and minds of most in the Upstate New York region, but Lo knows there’s more to the group than meets the eye. She’s spent the last six years of her life trying—and failing—to prove it.
When a man shows up at the magazine Lo works for claiming The Unity Project killed his son, Lo sees the perfect opportunity to expose the group and reunite with Bea once and for all. When her investigation puts her in the direct path of its leader, Lev Warren and as Lo delves deeper into The Project, the lives of its members it upends everything she thought she knew about her sister, herself, cults, and the world around her—to the point she can no longer tell what’s real or true. Lo never thought she could afford to believe in Lev Warren . . . but now she doesn’t know if she can afford not to.
Edition:
E-book from Net Galley. But I also own the paperback ARC, which I won in a Goodreads Giveaway that I forgot I had entered.
Disclaimer:
Since these were both review copies, consider this the standard disclaimer. They were received for review purposes, and that this did not in any way effect my review.
Trigger Warning:
- suicide
- abuse
- gaslighting
My Thoughts:
Initially I requested this book through all avenues available to me for two reasons: I love the cover, and I’m a sucker for stories about cults. Which I know you’ve heard me say (seen me write) like a million times before, so I won’t waste time going into that any further.
The way The Project starts is by introducing us to Bea as a young girl. She finds out her parents are having another baby, and she’s not too happy about it. But her parents are able to convince her that it’s going to be great, having a little sister. Bea and Lo are incredibly close right up until the accident that kills their parents and leaves Lo permanently scarred. By the time Lo wakes up, Bea is gone to join the Unity Project, having left Lo in the care of a relative she barely knows.
The story then flashes forward to present day. Lo is now a young woman and aspiring journalist. She hasn’t forgotten about Bea though, and she has been doing everything she can to try to get in contact with her older sister. She has gone to the Unity Project, attended their ‘open sermons,’ and directly contacted them by phone uncountable times – all to no avail.
What happened to Bea? They keep telling her that she is still there, and that she doesn’t want to have contact with Lo, but Lo just can’t accept that.
And then Lo witnesses the suicide of a young man – a member of the Unity Project. He spoke to her before he died, saying only:
“Whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.”
The man’s father believes that The Project drove him to suicide. Now Lo is more determined than ever to not only find her sister, but to uncover the dirty secrets behind The Unity Project.
If you like stories about cults, you should check this one out. It goes into how they get their claws into seemingly reasonable people, and how they keep them. It hits on all the sordid earmarks of cults: abuse, gaslighting, control, etc. Also heavily featured is the way they use charitable works to try to convert the general public. Because as long as it looks good from the outside, most of us don’t seem to really give a shit what questionable things take place behind the closed doors of places of worship. You’re probably going to knee-jerk here and bluster, “Of course we do!” but I want you to think long and hard about that. Because we don’t. If we did, we’d ensure that it didn’t happen again. But we don’t. We just get outraged for a minute, and then move on with our days.
About the Author:
(from the author’s Goodreads profile)
Courtney Summers is the bestselling author of several novels. Her work has been released to critical acclaim and multiple starred reviews, received numerous awards and honors–including the Edgar Award, the John Spray Mystery Award, the Cybils Award, the Odyssey Award, the Audie Award–and has enjoyed the recognition of many library, state, ‘Best Of’ and Readers’ Choice lists. Courtney has reviewed for The New York Times, is the founder of the 2015 worldwide trending hashtag #ToTheGirls, and in 2016, she was named one of Flare Magazine’s 60 under 30. She lives and writes in Canada. Her new novel, THE PROJECT, is available now from Wednesday Books. You can follow her on Instagram, Twitter and Facebook.
Rating:
I heard a lot of raving about this based on the fact that Summers wrote the novel Sadie, which is very popular. I haven’t read that one, but after reading The Project I fully intend to. It was a good book that I greatly enjoyed.
The Project By Courtney Summers Wednesday Books Published: February 2, 2021 ISBN: 9781250105738 Hardcover, E-book, Audiobook 352 Pages Author's Website
I NEED to pick this one up!! Awesome review!