Then She Was Gone

Lisa has done it once again! What an incredibly addictive read Then She Was Gone is.

 

Ellie went missing ten years ago and her mother; Laurel, still misses her “favourite” daughter every day.

 

Things are about to change… a relationship with a stranger is the key to unlocking the disturbing truth.

 

And that… my friends… is all I’m going to reveal about the plot. It’s just SO GOOD! Jewell has not left all her tricks for the end of the book either, she’s gone straight in and made a juicy page turner from the first page.

 

There’s no build up… you’re slap bang into uncovering the mystery straight away. I had sussed out ‘who’ had taken Ellie very early on and it felt as if Jewell had done this on purpose… pointed the reader in the right direction early on, leaving the reader greedy to sprint to the finish line and suss out the ‘why’ and the ‘how’. And even then, I felt Jewell gave away the ‘why’ and ‘how’ reasonably early… but I was still hooked! Why you may ask? I was intrigued what direction the rest of the book would take! I’m obviously writing this on an empty tummy because my analogy for this book is: you’re shown the meat, the potatoes and the veg so you know what you’re getting BUT the chef holds back how the dish will be served until it’s right in front of your eyes… and the ending was delicious just like a dessert – sweet, yet slightly bitter (think dark chocolate…) but satisfying.

 

It was emotionally captivating to read the majority of the book through the mother’s eyes. The brutal honesty in accepting the flaws in her personality made Laurel a likeable main character.

 

This book has all the fundamental traits of a psychological thriller – my mind was well and truly working ‘like the clappers’. I love the effect Jewell’s words have on me, every suspicious sentence sent alarm bells going off in my head with the associated commentary such as… “well that’s that, I don’t trust them”, “corrrr can you believe that” and “I knew it!!”.

 

At the time of writing this post, the hardback version of this book is currently a steal at £5 in Tesco and a penny cheaper in Sainsburys… well worth popping in your shopping basket!

 

Until next time, Chloé x