Sara Parcell, age sixteen, vanished from Frederick, Maryland, ten years ago. She became the focus of a television series in the days and weeks that followed her disappearance, keeping viewers across the country glued to their screens. This is the fictitious true crime-inspired story of Sara’s disappearance, but more importantly, the lengths to which the television industry and its players will go for entertainment.
Ten years later, those involved in the case, Sara’s peers, family members, neighbours, the police officers involved, the television executives and crew working on the series, a pop culture critic and the SareBears Facebook group founder, tell the whole story—or at least their side of what happened during those weeks in April—for the first time. As a result, Kill Show reads like a true crime documentary.
There is bound to be some discontinuity with the fragmented commentary of twenty-six characters. Sweren-Becker is taking a risk with this experiment. Changing characters almost every paragraph can be jarring, fragmented, and disrupt the flow of the story. A more suspenseful outcome might have been possible without it. Where it does succeed is in providing a variety of points of view through multiple narratives, with each character’s insight into what happened while also casting doubt as to which of the narrators are trustworthy and telling the truth. Each has their own motivation and their own secret. Suspicions moves from one person to another, from the bus driver to the banker, etc. Hints are dropped as to what happened to Sara, but for the most part readers are kept in the dark.
The impression is that the main narrative is about Sara and her disappearance, but she is absent and voiceless for the majority of the novel. Sara isn’t the main character. This is about the absurdity of a real-time true crime television series and the commentary Sweren-Becker makes on society’s behaviour under these circumstances. And it’s a compelling argument with plenty of food for thought.
Casey Hawthorne, a producer at television station TNN, is without a doubt the most morally ambiguous character. When she comes across the YouTube video that Jack, Sara’s brother, uploaded of his parents having a private discussion about Sara going missing, she instantly recognises the potential for a docuseries that will draw in viewers and money. Searching for Sara is pitched to her boss as a docuseries that follows the events surrounding Sara’s disappearance in real time—something that hasn’t been done before. Sara’s parents, Dave and Jeannette, are easily persuaded to sign away their privacy for a large sum of money without fully considering the implications for their family and the rest of the town. Unfortunately, their decision has serious consequences.
Casey’s moral compass needs to be realigned. She is ruthlessly ambitious and unlikable, and she manipulates people in the name of entertainment, purposefully causing friction, arguments, and tension in order to elicit the best possible reaction for increased viewership. Similarly, she suppresses her emotions, prioritising her work over her relationships, including her brief relationship with Det. Felix Calderon, the detective investigating Sara’s disappearance. The question is raised whether someone can “…hold on to their humanity while devoting their life to selling tragedies of their fellow man?” It’s up to the reader to decide.
The sections presented by professor of sociology Molly Lowe were the most interesting because they get right to the core issue at hand. What does it say about our society when the tragedy of people’s lives and crime is normalised to the point where we see it as entertainment. Why do we look for comfort in mysteries, cold cases, and violence?
As previously stated, this extends to the ethics of journalism, where to draw the line between moral responsibility and entertainment manipulation. Additionally, it briefly touches on the stereotype known as the “missing white woman syndrome,” an archetype which fits Sara Purcell perfectly.
Instead of being a traditional plot-driven crime novel, Kill Show is more of a why-dunnit than a who-dunnit, with strong commentary on the entertainment industry at its core.
Kill Show is published by Harper Collins and they kindly gifted me with a review copy of the novel.
About the author
Daniel Sweren-Becker is an author, a television writer, and a playwright living in Los Angeles. He graduated from Wesleyan University and received an MFA from New York University. His play Stress Positions premiered in New York City at the SoHo Playhouse, and he is the author of the novels The Ones and The Equals.
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