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    Who Killed Christopher Goodman?: Based on a True Crime
    Unavailable
    Who Killed Christopher Goodman?: Based on a True Crime
    Unavailable
    Who Killed Christopher Goodman?: Based on a True Crime
    Audiobook4 hours

    Who Killed Christopher Goodman?: Based on a True Crime

    Written by Allan Wolf

    Narrated by Nick Podehl, Kate Rudd, Will Damron and

    3.5/5

    ()

    Currently unavailable

    Currently unavailable

    About this audiobook

    Inspired by a tragic true event in his past, Allan Wolf examines the circumstances of one boy's inexplicable murder and the fateful summer leading up to it.

    Everybody likes Chris Goodman. Sure, he's a little odd. He wears those funny bell-bottoms and he really likes the word ennui and he shakes your hand when he meets you, but he's also the kind of guy who's always up for a good time, always happy to lend a hand. Everybody likes Chris Goodman, which makes it especially shocking when he's murdered. Here, in a stunning multi-voiced narrative-including the perspective of the fifteen-year-old killer-and based on a true and terrible crime that occurred when he was in high school, author Allan Wolf sets out to answer the first question that comes to mind in moments of unthinkable tragedy: how could a thing like this happen?

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherBrilliance Audio
    Release dateMar 7, 2017
    ISBN9781536662023
    Unavailable
    Who Killed Christopher Goodman?: Based on a True Crime

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    Reviews for Who Killed Christopher Goodman?

    3.5/5

    25 ratings9 reviews

    What did you think?

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    Review must be at least 10 words

    • 4/5
      Quick read. Kept me turnng the pages to see "who dunnit". Interesting cast of characters-nice job with the multiple POV's.
    • 4/5
      I really enjoyed this YA read. I really like that the story was episodic, with each episode told from different points of view. I only gave it 4 stars because the outcome was predictable and I felt the poems/letters at the end were rushed and should been "more" somehow. Additionally I enjoyed the author's note on his real life inspiration and how that incident has impacted his life. The book brings up "butterfly effect" ideas and questions- what if I had... would that have changed his course and outcome???Overall a well- written and thought provoking YA novel.
    • 2/5
      It sounds like the book was therapeutic writing for the author, and I assume that people who remember this tragedy will enjoy reading this book too, but for me, it was something of a mess. It's too bad, since I can see a great story somewhere in the constantly shifting points of view, in the random poems, in the stupid dialogues, in the experimental format, in the sentence fragments. In the author's note Allan Wolfe says he wanted to write a story about teens having to deal with the sudden and violent death of a classmate they could have known better, which is a great idea. But the execution of it clearly failed.I was excited to read this book, thinking it would be similar to Columbine by David Cullen or The Hate List by Jennifer Brown. I do think this would have been better if the author hadn't gotten wrapped up in the idea of being different, and wrote a mishmash of thoughts from characters that sounded so similar that I lost track of them after awhile.
    • 5/5
      Absolutely fantastic! This was a straight read through for me. I couldn't turn the pages fast enough. It's written in one of my favourite styles: a narrative from six different voices telling the story from their own point of view, this includes the killer. This book isn't a mystery. We know who gets killed and who did the killing from the start but we know little else. Like the narrators, we piece the story together as they tell it. The book is ultimately about how these teens, each approx. 16-17, deal with the aftermath of someone they knew dying a violent death and each feeling guilty in some sort of way. It's the reality of such a death and how as human beings we can accept the consequences of our actions and reactions as well as receiving certain fruits of the spirit from them. Simply a wonderful book written in a no nonsense and touching manner.
    • 3/5
      I received a free copy of Who Killed Christopher Goodman from the publisher in exchange for an honest review -- thank you!This is a compelling concept for a novel: when Christopher Goodman dies, a group of teens, including his killer, recount what happened and reflect on Christopher's place in their lives. The narrators knew him but were not that close to him, which I found to be an interesting decision since many books about loss are not about people on the periphery. A lot of the book rang true from my own teenage years.Having said that, I think this book was too short. A longer book would have allowed for more development of the characters and better differentiation between them that doesn't just rely on stereotypes or their boiled-down identity of genius, farm girl, stamp collector, etc.
    • 5/5
      Who Killed Christopher Goodman? by Allan WolfSet in 1979 this is the story of (a teenage) boy named Christopher Goodman. A young man who was a bit different, yet very likable, friendly and kind. When Christopher is found murdered the whole school is shaken up, and left to wonder why.A fast paced story told through alternating voices of those who knew Christopher. Details of the days leading up to this senseless crime. I got to feel what each person was thinking and feeling which drew (me) in more. I highly recommend Who Killed Christopher Goodman? to all.*I received this book from Library Thing in exchange for an honest review.
    • 3/5
      Narrated by Jesse Lee, Nick Podehl, Lauren Ezzo, Whitney Dykhouse, Scott Merriman, Scott Lange, Kate Rudd, Will Damron. Several teens in a small Virginia town in 1979 grapple with the violent death of a classmate. Told primarily in flashback, the alternating perspectives recall interactions with Christopher Goodman leading up to the tragic events during the Deadwood Days festival. Chris is a friendly guy, shaking hands with the people he meets and is notable for wearing “elephant bells,” super-wide bell-bottom pants. In an afterword, the author describes how the book was inspired by real events that took place when he was in high school back in 1979.
    • 4/5
      Set in Virgina in 1979, Who Killed Christopher Goodman by author Allan Wolf is a compelling and insightful YA novel based on a real murder in Wolf’s hometown when he was a teenager. Several teens discuss their encounters with another teen, Christopher Goodman, before his murder and their reactions afterwards. The story is a fast easy read but, in this case, fast and easy in form does not mean lack of emotional impact. As we get to know each of these young people, it is impossible not to develop a sense of empathy and caring towards them. The book is divided between the narratives of each of the teens told in their own distinctive voice and in varying forms including poetry: Doc Chestnut ‘The Sleepwalker’, Squib Kaplan ‘The Genius’, Hunger McCoy ‘The Good Ol’ Boy’, Hazel Turner ‘The Farm Girl’, Mildred Penny ‘The Stamp Collector’ and occasionally Leonard Pelf ‘The Runaway’ and 15-year-old murderer. The only one who does not have his own voice is Christopher whose story is told by the others from their own perspective based on their casual encounters with him before his murder and in a class assignment afterwards. But his name tells us the most important thing the reader needs to know about him – at only seventeen, he was already a good man. The story, however, is not really about the murder which takes up only a couple of paragraphs in the book as described by Pelf. It is about how we try to find explanations for tragedy, the ‘what ifs’ that accompany them, how we seem to need to find our own role in the event – what we could have done differently to change the outcome and how the little things we do or don’t do may seem to have unintentional consequences. And, as each of the teens including Pelf, think about the tragedy, they contemplate their own ‘what ifs’ wondering how their own actions in which Goodman only paid a very small indirect role or no role at all contributed to his death. As Squib tells us at the end:This is not Christopher’s murder. It is ours. It belongs to all of us. It belongs to every single one of us who is left alive.
    • 4/5
      An ARC was provided in exchange for an honest review. This did not influence my thoughts in any way.Who Killed Christopher Goodman? was a super-fast read. I enjoyed how the story went back and forth between a few different characters. I was expecting it to be more of a true crime book but it’s really about the people. There’s very little about the actual crime.