Review: "I Witnessed" by Jeramey Kraatz and Crystal Jayme

I Witnessed by Jeramey Kraatz and Crystal Jayme
Published March 2025 via HarperAlley
★★★

If you grew up in the US, you probably know the story: once upon a time, a woman did (or didn't) pick up an axe and hack her father and stepmother to death. She was arrested, she was put on trial—and she was found not guilty. She lived the rest of her life in relative obscurity, and to this day nobody knows who committed the murders.

I learned about the Lizzie Borden case when I was in grade six, and it has stayed with me ever since. I'm not really sure why—I mean, yeah, I like reading true crime as much as the next person, but there's unsolved case upon unsolved case out there, and this should be no different. And yet...it's one of those things where, when a new book comes out, off I go to the library to seek it out.

Here, the story is told from the perspective of Lizzie Borden's next-door-neighbour, a boy who existed in real life but about whom little is known. A bit player at best in the real-life story but the main character here, Charlie is in the thick of it: he sees violence through his window and tracks a possible murderer through the woods; he tries to convince the police that he has something important to say; he eavesdrops on conversations and is the recipient of various oblique, confession-like comments from various characters. It's safe to say that Charlie is invested.

This is middle grade, so I'm not the target audience, and this is one where I can't really gauge how it would go over with kids. From my adult perspective, this fell a little flat—though the art was nice enough, I often struggled to distinguish between the various characters (especially Lizzie, her sister Emma, their maid Bridget, and Charlie's mother), and I guess I was just hoping that this would add something new to the books I've already read. I suppose that a tween would enjoy imagining themselves in the thick of it, not at risk but feeling as though they had a stake in the matter, but I think if this were going to be a fictionalization anyway, I'd have preferred it to twist things a little further rather than shoehorning in a character who knows more than the police do. But again: not the target audience! Perhaps someday there'll be another graphic novelization of the Borden murders that suits me better...and until then, I think I should probably go read The Lizzie Borden Trial again and see if my impressions have changed since I was a tween myself.