Then She was Gone

By Lisa Jewell
                    

Atria Books an Imprint of Simon & Schuster, 2017

Ellie Mack was the perfect daughter. She had a perfect life, perfect boyfriend, perfect family, and a fairy-tale future. Until, at the age of 17, she disappeared and her family fell apart; especially, her mom, Laurel.

I would age this at the New Adult level. While it’s about Ellie, it is primarily told from the perspective of the adults around her, ten years after her disappearance. Jewell creates deep characters and an interesting story-line told in five parts.

While Ellie’s family is prominent throughout the story, the primary characters are Ellie, a 17-year old dream child, Laurel, her adoring mother, Noelle, her obsessive tutor, and Floyd, first Noelle’s and later Laurel’s lover. These characters, as well as the minor characters, are superbly crafted which is what kept me vested in the story. Although I was pretty sure I had the mystery figured out, (and, yes, I did, very early on) I had to know how things worked out for them.

My disappointment is the POV. Part One is the set-up. Presented in limited third-person POV change between Laurel today and Ellie THEN. I haven’t read a lot of third person lately I found it well done and refreshing but it took some getting used to.  Part Two is essentially Laurel finally accepting Ellie’s fate and moving on.

But then we come to Part Three which for me totally disrupts the flow of the story. We already know the when, where, and why of the mystery. Here, in Noelle’s voice, we are told the how. (The only remaining question is who, but I bet you can guess).  Who is Noelle talking to? Supposedly Floyd, but she is not present so how can this be? This would have been better presented as Noelle’s journal and earlier in the story amongst the THEN retrospections of Part Two. Part Three revisits information already given to us by Laurel and Ellie and really slows the plot pace down.

Part Four flips POV between an omniscient narrator and Noelle which doesn’t work for me. Then Part Five is told in the first person POV of Floyd (via a video but still). WHAT????? Whiplash.

Then She Was Gone is a contemporary mystery, set in England. (I actually had to look up what a jumper was. Should have remembered from my Hogwarts days.) Great characters and a strong story although the mystery was revealed too soon for my taste, and I would have preferred a different structure.

Overall, I gave it a B. A good read with a flawed format.

the Secrets we Keep

By Trisha Leaver

Farrow, Strauss & Giroux, 2015

 It’s hard to review this novel without spoilers so watch for the alert.

SECRETS is an emotional contemporary YA with themes of devotion between sisters, divisions within family, and the conflict of teen identity crises. I rated this a B+.

Ella’s character and story are deep and well presented. Some of it is a little beyond realistic but that’s why we call it fiction.

Polar-opposite identical twin sisters Maddy and Ella are in a car accident. Maddy is wearing Ella’s coat when she dies. Ella survives but wakes with no memory of who she is. Everyone believes she is Maddy; the super-perfect, popular girl everyone loves. Ella soon figures it out but decides to be Maddy because that’s who everyone around her wants her to be.

SPOILER ALERT:  But when Ella discovers a dark secret about Maddy. She decides she owes it to Maddy to right her wrong. And now she knows it’s okay to be Ella, flawed and alive; after all, Maddy wasn’t perfect.