Earlier this year, I read and absolutely loved I Found You by Lisa Jewell so I was so excited to be given the opportunity to read her latest novel – Then She Was Gone.
Book Description:
A MISSING GIRL
A BURIED SECRET
THEN
She was fifteen, her mother’s golden girl. She had her whole life ahead of her. And then, in the blink of an eye, Ellie was gone.
NOW
It’s been ten years since Ellie disappeared, but Laurel has never given up hope of finding her daughter.
And then one day a charming and charismatic stranger called Floyd walks into a café and sweeps Laurel off her feet.
Before too long she’s staying the night at this house and being introduced to his nine year old daughter.
Poppy is precocious and pretty – and meeting her completely takes Laurel’s breath away.
Because Poppy is the spitting image of Ellie when she was that age. And now all those unanswered questions that have haunted Laurel come flooding back.
What happened to Ellie?
Where did she go?
Who still has secrets to hide?
My Thoughts:
If I were to sum this book up in one word, it would be… predictable. I knew from very early on what was going to happen and that really sucked the suspense out of the story for me. And I can’t attribute me predicting the way the plot would go to reading so many books in this genre, this plot was just super predictable, plain and simple. As soon as certain characters were introduced, you just knew how they’d factor in the story.
As I continued reading, I hoped something would surprise me but no curve ball came. Towards the end of this novel, I started skim reading certain paragraphs as I wanted to get to new revelations – there was one mini reveal that I didn’t predict but I felt it was so underwhelming because even though I didn’t predict it, it was still predictable [in the sense that it added nothing to the plot because it was an obvious action a certain character would have done after the main reveal].
I did really enjoy the beginning of this book, I was hooked and really interested, especially because of the narration style – I really liked hearing some of the narration from Ellie herself. In the beginning, I liked Laurel the most because Jewell portrayed her pain in a raw and real way. You do get to see how Ellie’s disappearance affected the family but again nothing jumped out at me and pulled me into the plot once my interest began to wane. Unfortunately, I have nothing else to offer on this one. Bar Ellie and Laurel, all the other characters came across as quite bland. There was no urgency, no tension or suspense – there was a certain part in the story where I felt the psychological thrills could have been capitalised on but it just didn’t manifest to the level I’d hoped.
It may seem I’m being harsh in this review, but I loved I Found You so much, as a reader, I just can’t believe how much I loved I Found You in comparison to this one, if you told me the books were written by a different author – I’d believe you. However, Jewell has a wealth of writing experience and I’m sure this book will be enjoyed by many and I will still read some of the novels on her backlist because I’m so interest to see if I enjoy them.
So, I end this review stating, this was not a case of, if you liked one, you’ll like the other – if you’re going to read one of Jewell’s book this year, make it I Found You.
If you want to give this one a try, it’s available from: Amazon UK / Book Depository
It seems crazy how different you can experience books by the same author. Good thing you loved the first one you read so you know she’s got it in her and this just wasn’t the book for you. A lot of it stands are falls with predictability for me as well ;-).
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I still can’t believe how different my reading experiences were! I can handle some predictability if the plot is entertaining but this one really didn’t have much going on. It’s definitely a good job I read I Found You first otherwise it may have sat on my shelf for ages!
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I also loved I Found You. Lately many of reads have started off with a suspenseful beginning, but seem to take a turn after 50-60% and I’ve ended up not enjoying the ending!
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This one switched of the suspense way before the half way mark 🙈
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Great review Janel, it’s hard to write reviews of not liked books imo! Hope your next read is 5 star:)
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Thanks Renee, I still can’t get over how different the reading experiences were between this one and I Found You but you can’t love every book.
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I totally get how it is when you love one book from an author but don’t like some other ones. It’s weird, but happens all the time! I’ve heard a lot of good things about I Found You and it’s been on my To-Read shelf for a while! I thought your review was thorough and great!
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Thank you. It’s never nice when you have to write a review for a book you didn’t enjoy so I appreciate your comment 😊 And yay to having I Found You on your TBR, that’s a very good one for sure!
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Oh I know, it’s the worst! Yes, I will have to read it soon! 🙂
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That’s a shame, I’m keen to read this, I liked I Found You but actually preferred The Girls in the Garden. Very nice review that seems incredibly balanced.
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Thank you. I haven’t read The Girls in the Garden, I’ll have to check that one out 🙂
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Loved your review. I completely agree with you.
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Thanks, such a shame though, hopefully her next book is a good one!
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What a shame you didn’t enjoy it, especially after enjoying I Found You so much. I confess I love her books and have read quite a few of earlier one and agree that this one is very different.
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It’s seems a few people think this one is quite different but they enjoyed it more than me so that’s good (for them haha). I’ll definitely read more of her books though because I enjoyed I Found You so much!
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