#5 in Contemporary fiction
Where the Crawdads Sing
- 400
- Pages
- about 7 h
- Reading time
- NYT bestseller · 193 weeks on the list, peaked at #1
- Reese's Book Club
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Our view
The marsh is the real achievement here: the North Carolina coast is written with such patient attention that the setting stays in the mind longer than the plot. Kya’s lonely growing-up is the heart of the novel. The romance and the murder investigation woven around it do not convince everyone: some feel the book wants to be three genres at once. For those who read for place and character rather than for the mystery.
The view of the BookRank editors, written from readers’ ratings and comments. It does not affect the score or the book’s place in a ranking.
About the book
Where the Crawdads Sing is a 2018 coming-of-age murder mystery novel by American zoologist Delia Owens. The story follows two timelines that slowly intertwine. The first timeline describes the life and adventures of a young girl named Kya as she grows up isolated in the marshes of North Carolina. The second timeline follows an investigation into the apparent murder of Chase Andrews, a local celebrity of Barkley Cove, a fictional coastal town of North Carolina. By April 2023, the book had sold over 18 million copies. A film adaptation was released in July 2022.
Where the score comes from
The sources average 8.2 across 1,787 ratings. With that many, the reader vote carries 92% of the weight and the score stays at 8.2 — the Contemporary fiction average of 7.7 barely moves it.
| Source | Average | Ratings | Weight |
|---|---|---|---|
| Open Library | 8.6 | 101 | 6% |
| Google Books | 7.0 | 9 | 1% |
| Hardcover | 8.2 | 1.7K | 94% |
Frequently asked
How long is Where the Crawdads Sing?
It has 400 pages — shorter than 54% of the ranked books in Contemporary fiction.
In this book
Themes this book shares with others — each leads to the best books on it.
If you liked this
Same shelf — Contemporary fiction — with scores between 7.7 and 8.3, closest to this book.
