Book Rewind Audiobook Review: Allegedly by Tiffany D. Jackson

When I picked up Allegedly, I thought I was starting a contemporary focused on our broken juvenile justice system. While the story dives deep into the subject, what I didn’t realize is I was picking up a thriller. A thriller that kept me up reading till 4am, when I passed out with the book in my hands only to awaken 4 hours later and finish it. If you haven’t picked up Allegedly, there’s no better time (and be sure to preorder her upcoming book, Grown).

Allegedly

by Tiffany D. Jackson
Published by: Katherine Tegen Books
on January 24, 2017
Pages: 390
Audiobook through LibroFM, Audible
Goodreads

Mary B. Addison killed a baby.
Allegedly. She didn’t say much in that first interview with detectives, and the media filled in the only blanks that mattered: A white baby had died while under the care of a churchgoing black woman and her nine-year-old daughter. The public convicted Mary and the jury made it official. But did she do it? She wouldn’t say.
Mary survived six years in baby jail before being dumped in a group home. The house isn’t really “home”—no place where you fear for your life can be considered a home. Home is Ted, who she meets on assignment at a nursing home.
There wasn’t a point to setting the record straight before, but now she’s got Ted—and their unborn child—to think about. When the state threatens to take her baby, Mary must find the voice to fight her past. And her fate lies in the hands of the one person she distrusts the most: her Momma. No one knows the real Momma. But who really knows the real Mary?

Review

What does it mean when you love and hate someone at the same time? It means they’re family.

Mary killed baby. Allegedly.

Allegedly.

A word that has become familiar to those of us who have watched Making a Murderer or listened to Serial. A word that can make or break the trial-by-media that comes with any high profile case, especially the murder of a baby with a juvenile suspect.

Allegedly uses the lens of Mary to take us through the world of the juvenile justice system, complex , abusive family situations, and the failure of the systems that are supposed to protect children. Along the way, there are breadcrumbs that lead you through the forest and right into the house of the hungry grandmother. This isn’t a story of innocence or guilt; this is a story of how imperfect the world is. How nothing is black and white. How easily swayed we are.

Allegedly is inspired by a true story and explores the potential aftermath of such a complex case. Tiffany’s writing is incredibly strong and will suck you in until the very end. The audiobook is haunting, narrated by the amazing Bahni Turpin.