Suspense

Twelve-year-old Maddie has disappeared over night. Suspicion, of course quickly falls on her family. Her mother, Karen has a tragic past, and a newly, but sometimes unsure relationship with her daughter. Ryan, her father, is occasionally hot-headed and is under a lot of strain, and her older brother, Tyler, claims to have heard voices in her room the night she disappeared. The investigation, like most missing persons cases, is active in the beginning, but it eventually goes into the cold-case files and years have passed. Then a staggering turn of events stuns everyone… shocking secrets rise to the surface. Revelations that may finally lead to the truth about Maddie’s disappearance. This was a fantastic story, but this is a usual occurrence for this author. The characters were well drawn and very believable. The guessing game of "who done it" was fun...although I didn't do so well. One thing that made the story "life-like" was that the police investigation was realistic. No one just miraculously came in a immediately discovered the killer. The investigators worked at it. The reader could also feel the sorrow and the strain that the case being re-opened placed on the family and how they struggled to relive this nightmare. There were some really big surprises that I never saw coming. I never saw a lot of things coming with this novel, which made it a challenge in a really good way. It's been quite some time since I last read a Rick Mofina novel, but I will be reading more of them in the future. ( )

I hate giving bad reviews to books with under 100 reviews. But the other reviews are all so positive, and I don't know what book they were reading because the book I read was just... not good. There were SO many characters that I kept having to go back and figure out who was talking and when. The writing itself was cohesive, but nothing above average (and I did spot quite a few grammatical errors, though that isn't the author's fault so much as the editor's). The plot was kind of ridiculous, honestly. And it felt like every chapter was trying so hard to have a cliffhanger, but I just didn't care enough for any of them to be effective.

I kept reading only because I like to finish things I commit to unless it's really unbearable. There was also zero character development and the only characters who had distinct personalities were the mom and some other guy I forgot the name of already. I felt like somehow it was both slow-moving and yet had so much going on that it was hard to keep track of the different storylines. I also felt like the ending was just stupid. It was like, happily ever after to an absurd extent.

It's definitely not the worst book I ever read. I understood what was going on, I kept reading until the end, and I did genuinely want to know what happened. But like, the blandness of the title speaks for itself. At best, it was unremarkable. But the best word to describe this book? Disappointing.

P.S. if the author sees this, I'm so sorry and it's not personal and I hate hate hate giving bad reviews so I hope you take this in a constructive way and work on some of the things I mentioned for your next book. I'm sure you're a wonderful person and this is making me very sad. I'm sorry. ( )

Twelve-year-old Maddie and her brother Ryan are home with a sitter one night. Their parents come home. The kids seem to be fine, asleep. When they wake up in the morning, Maddie is gone.

This crime drama/mystery was gripping and well-paced. There are so many possibilities for what could have happened. Did something untoward happen while the babysitter was over? A boy Maddie could have secretly been seeing? The halfway house just behind the woods from their property? Could one of her parents have done this? And just like in any child abduction, the narrative gives more possibilities than answers as we’re taken through the police investigation.

This story is told in two parts—the first in the days immediately following Maddie’s disappearance, and part two taking place four years later. Some reviewers found the first section slow, but I thought the mystery unfolded at a good pace. When we get to part two and the story begins to reveal itself, it’s a race to the end.

Please excuse typos/name misspellings. Entered on screen reader.
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Missing Daughter by Rick Mofina is a 2019 MIRA publication.

I’m trying to get back to some of my pre-pandemic reading goals, one of which was to sample work from authors I have never read before. Rick Mofina is a name I’ve seen circulating amongst my Goodreads friends in the mystery/thriller category for a long while. I have a handful of his books on my Kindle, but I never have gotten around to reading any of them.

I was drawn to the title of this one because, although missing person’s cases are hardly original, there is something so utterly unsettling about someone simply vanishing into thin air, it sucks me in every time.

This book was no exception. When twelve-year-old Maddie disappears during the night, swift suspicion falls on her family:

Her mother, Karen has a tragic past, and a newly contentious relationship with her daughter. Ryan, her father, who is occasionally hot-headed and is under a lot of strain, and her older brother, Tyler, who claims to have heard voices in her room the night she disappeared.

The investigation, like most missing persons cases, is hot in the beginning, but it eventually goes cold. Years pass. Then a staggering turn of events stuns everyone…

Suddenly, shocking secrets float to the surface. Will these revelations finally lead to the truth about Maddie’s disappearance?

This turned out to be a fantastic novel of suspense, complimented by terrific characterizations, and even, well-timed pacing. It held my attention from start to finish, not only with the guessing game, but with the realistic depictions of police interrogations and the emotional strain of a family stuck in a never- ending nightmare. It’s an emotional and absorbing novel, with some huge surprises I ever could have seen coming.

Overall, I am pleased with my first impression of this author and am glad I finally got around to reading one of his books. It goes without saying, I will be reading more of them in the future.

4 stars ( )