Here we go with a another new thriller with “girl” in the title. Released on June 28 2016, All the Missing Girls is pegged as the next thriller to be loved by those fans of The Girl on the Train and Gone Girl. That should have been a clue for me to abstain but I was game to read another thriller this summer.
Nicolette Farrell left her small hometown in Cooley Ridge ten years earlier after the mysterious disappearance of her best friend Corinne. She started a new life in Philadelphia after finishing her studies, with great job and rich lawyer boyfriend coming after. It’s ten years later and Nicolette, alias Nic is enticed into returning to her hometown to help organize the family home, which will go up for sale to help take care of her ailing father. After only being there for a few days, Annaleise disappears and the mystery continues. The key to this novel is its structure since the author, Megan Miranda decided to tell the story backward from Day 15 to Day 1.
Essentially I was intrigued by this book mostly because of the structure, but as I started I quickly realized it wasn’t for me. Firstly, all of the characters are unlikely and untrustworthy. As the reader I was thrown into a setting that I was trying to figure out the entire time but there weren’t any clues. The story is told from Nic’s point of view and she basically tells the reader everything. Nothing is being shown. The development is very natural so I just read to see what was happening next with no real desire. I feel like the structure of the novel really impeded any real mystery in the story. Not to mention, I didn’t care about the characters, what they went through ten years ago or what they were going through in the present. They seemed to be two dimensional at best. There was even one character who served no real purpose to the story.
As for the good stuff, Megan Miranda does have an easy to read writing style. It flows very well. Some of the best passages were those that conjured up atmosphere and a bit of spookiness and particularly for the scenes mentioning the woods, which are a very crucial part of the story. She also had a clever idea of changing up the structure by telling the story backward, however it wasn’t enough to keep me intrigued. I was bored and couldn’t wait for it to be over.
Meghan Miranda is the author of four YA novels called Soulprint, Vengeance, Hysteria, and Fracture. She has also released another YA novel called The Safest Lies on May 24th of this year. All the Missing Girls was Miranda’s first attempt at writing a novel for adults.
My Copy: All the Missing Girls, ARC paperback, 368 pages
Rating: **
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