The Cave Dwellers

April 1, 2021
A wealthy, influential couple and their teenage daughter are ambushed, tortured, and murdered in their Georgetown mansion before the stately home is set on fire. The brutal crime upends the tight-knit Washington, DC, enclave in which politicians rub elbows with media moguls and cabinet secretaries hobnob with corporate titans. While the deaths of Genevieve and David Banks titillate their social circle, the murder of young Audrey captivates her own peer group, a snooty, privileged little cabal of students at a tony private academy. When a Black man is charged with the murders, only classmate Bunny Bartholomew is willing to risk her reputation and security in a sincere but misguided attempt to see that justice is done. McDowell, who was born in DC to a prominent securities attorney who was later imprisoned for financial crimes, uses her first-hand knowledge of this competitive milieu to capture its obsession with status with a deftly ironic flair while subtly probing sobering themes of white supremacy, political corruption, elitist privilege, old money, and new influence. Through blunt caricatures and sharp characterizations, McDowell archly demonstrates her disdain for the superficiality of such an existence and combines social satire with moral outrage to offer a masterfully crafted, absorbing read that can simply entertain on one level and provoke reasoned discourse on another.

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