ARC Review: A Southern Gothic Mystery

We Already Dug The Grave by Emma C. Wells

Publication Date: September 8, 2026

Summary from NetGalley:

Milly can’t divine the future anymore, and maybe that’s a good thing. Lately, her life has been bleak enough, she doesn’t need the now-silent tea leaves to tell her. Meanwhile, her estranged younger sister thrives miles away in a shiny new life with a shiny new marriage. Milly doesn’t blame Francis for wanting nothing to do with her. Not after what happened in that Tennessee meadow a decade before.

But when Francis shows up on Milly’s doorstep with a black eye and a plea for help – Milly can’t say no. Especially when the tea leaves are finally crystal clear: if the sisters don’t kill Francis’s husband, he’ll kill her.

And if they’re going to plot a murder, the sisters have no choice but to return to the one place they’d left behind. A place where another body – and a multitude of secrets – were buried. Because this isn’t the first time the sisters have needed to dispose of a bad man. In fact, they might be pretty good at it.

ARC provided by Poisoned Pen Press via Netgalley for an honest review.

Confession:

This was an enjoyable enough read, although the pacing and length could use some work. I did like the characters and many of the themes, but it really dragged at times and it also felt repetitive.

Millie is a very intriguing character, very morally gray, but also smart, brave and loyal to her family. But even so, she had a huge blind spot when it came to her sister and missed some huge red flags that concerned her and her behavior. I wanted to shake her and tell her to wake up and see the truth about what was really going on. But alas, when reality caught up to her, it was too late. Her relationship with her sister seemed a bit one sided, but for Millie it was all about protecting her younger sister

Francis was a character that I didn’t like from the start and never warmed up to. She was very self centered and only cared about things that concerned her. I could tell that there was more to the story than what she was saying and that she was hiding a multitude of secrets.

I did love the aunts though. I would definitely read a story about them as younger women, especially Aunt Hattie. There is a lot of hurt in this family and generational trauma, that these women have survived, and the scars are what keep them going. I loved the whole witchy aspect of their lives, with the sight and reading tea leaves being one of the ways they have survived over the years.

The story as a whole, never quite worked for me. I guessed pretty early on what was really going on, so the big twist at the end was no surprise. The pacing was way too slow for the most part for a story that is supposed to be a thriller. And there also seemed to be way too much repetition, especially surrounding Millie’s feelings and thoughts. This repetition contributed to the feel that the story was too long. Finally, the open ended ending just really didn’t work for me. I wanted a bit more closure on all of the major storylines.

Overall I thought this story had some good bones, but needed a bit of tightening up in the pacing which would help with the tension and thriller aspects of the story.