All of Us Murderers by KJ Charles
Published 2025 · 88,000 words · about 5 hours at an average pace · Mystery & Crime, Romance, LGBTQ+ Fiction
How hard is All of Us Murderers to read?
All of Us Murderers scores 33 out of 100 for difficulty on ReadingRate, making it moderately challenging. The score is a weighted composite of nine measures: four of how hard the prose is to parse, five of how hard the meaning is to extract.
- Vocabulary: 33 out of 100
- A genre mystery-romance in a witty Edwardian voice, with period flavor and Gothic atmosphere but no dense or archaic diction. It sits near Beach Read in clarity, with slightly more period texture.
- Sentence structure: 33 out of 100
- First-person narration by Zeb keeps sentences conversational and brisk, with period phrasing that adds mild formality. Far simpler than classic Gothic prose, closer to contemporary accessible fiction.
- Abstraction: 28 out of 100
- The story runs on concrete events: a locked manor, a marriage contest, murders and a rekindled relationship. The ideas stay tied to plot and character, like a puzzle mystery.
- Information density: 38 out of 100
- A country-house whodunit needs the reader to track a cast of suspects, family secrets and clues. That is manageable, plot-driven density, comparable to The Housemaid.
- Narrative indirection: 40 out of 100
- Zeb is the sole narrator, so readers weigh his view of the family and of Gideon against the clues. The mystery format asks for inference, but the telling stays direct.
- Symbolic density: 35 out of 100
- The Gothic house, the family curse and the ghostly hints carry atmosphere and genre meaning. They work as signposted genre devices rather than deep allegory.
- Ironic distance: 40 out of 100
- Reviewers note a sly sense of humor and wit, and the Crimson Peak meets Knives Out pitch implies playful genre awareness. The tone is knowing but engaged, not deeply ironic.
- Resolution withholding: 22 out of 100
- A whodunit with a romance promises answers about the murders and a satisfying relationship arc. Reviewers call it a satisfying whodunit, so closure is the genre norm, as in Beach Read.
- Structural complexity: 28 out of 100
- A single narrator and a contained setting give a linear locked-house structure. Its twists and large suspect pool add some plotting complexity.
How All of Us Murderers is regarded
All of Us Murderers holds a literary regard score of 26 out of 100, weighing its place in the canon, its critical reception, its influence on other writers, and the standing of its author. Regard is measured separately from difficulty: a demanding book is not necessarily an admired one.