Then She Was Gone

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I found it a suspenseful story, but too predictable. I certainly wasn’t bored reading it, but the twists and turns weren’t twisty enough for my liking. If you loved “Girls in the Garden” and “I Found You” you will definitely love this book. For me this one was a little difficult to read because the behavior of this probable psychopath was just so twisted and ugly. After starting this novel I couldn’t quit, her writing is just so compelling, those of the words I would use to describe it! It sort of feels like I've read a hundred different variations of the missing daughter/grieving mother plot, and Then She Was Gone doesn't really do anything new with it. The writing is strong, but it's disappointing when you figure out all the major reveals in the first few chapters and even get the reasons behind them. As soon as certain characters are introduced, I was thinking “ah, got it” and, unfortunately, I was right. I kept hoping something exciting would happen to prove me wrong, but it really is as obvious as it seems. Once again, I am impressed with Lisa Jewell’s storytelling. I thought this was a terrific story. Told from multiple points of view, alternating between ‘then’ and ‘now’, I was enthralled as everything was revealed.

And then one day a charming and charismatic stranger called Floyd walks into a café and sweeps Laurel off her feet. Forget about solving all these crimes; the signal triumph here is (spoiler) the heroine’s survival.I believe in bad vibes and listening to your instincts but why include a stereotypical hippie dippy character to warn Laurel? This is the third Lisa Jewell thriller that I have read and she has penned another winner! After finishing this book I really had to wait a few days to sort of “SETTLE ME DOWN” as this mystery touched some very delicate feelings in me, more so than her first two books. Call me a snob but in my experience with thrillers, it has been hard to find many with the combination of great writing, past and present POV’s that flow seamlessly together, and create emotions that well up inside of you and really stay with you. I don't know whether I can call this book a thriller. There are not many unexpected twists in this story. So can I call it a book coming under the gentle of "acutely observed family drama"? I think that it is a mixture of both genres. The vacillating between the past and the present is done perfectly by the author. The mendacious mercurial nature of some characters in this book will rattle you to the extent of even making you nihilistic. As Laurel continued to dig more, she will reach to a dangerous point of no return and she’ll wish to stop before taking more steps.

Floyd is kind and sensitive and has a young daughter named Poppy, who looks inexplicably like Ellie.

The book opens from Ellie’s point of view ten years earlier. Life is going great for Ellie. She’s doing well in school and the boy she’s had her eye on seems to like her too. Her future is bright. As you may imagine Laurel is devastated, barely holding up but one day she meets Floyd at a cafe, sharing a carrot cake and the charming, mysterious, charismatic mathematician blows her mind. And another surprising thing about this man is her 9 years old daughter named Poppy who lives with her, has great resemblance with her deceased daughter. From Noelle's perspective, in the past) After Noelle kidnaps Ellie, she keeps her in the basement. She gives her the hamsters as pets. One day, she drugs her and soon Ellie realizes she's pregnant. Noelle pretends to Floyd that she's pregnant. However, a month before the baby is due, Floyd breaks it off anyway. Laurel meets Floyd Dunn at a cafe, and they go to dinner at a Eritrean restaurant. Floyd has two kids, a 21-year-old named Sara-Jade (from his first marriage to Kate Virtue) and Poppy, 9-year-old from a casual relationship. Poppy's mother abandoned her at his doorstep when Poppy was four.

A jewel. A treasure. And even though I had an inkling about where this was going, it didn't diminish my pleasure in this read at all. Laurel's daughter in law, Blue, spouts New Age mumbo jumbo about how she didn't like Floyd when she met him because he has a bad aura or some crap like that. Ellie was fifteen eager to take her exams. Now that she had been tutored in math she was sure she would do well. On her way to the library one evening, she disappears. Her disappearance takes a huge toll on the family, a family that breaks apart as many families in this type of situations often do. Now ten years later, Laurel is willing to take a shot at having a life and love again a series of events will send her reeling. Would she finally find out what happened to her daughter? Floyd writes books about mathematics and number theory. On their next day, he tells her he Googled her and knows about Ellie. They sleep together. Laurel meets his kids, and is floored when she realizes Poppy looks just like Ellie. Poppy and Floyd have a very close relationship, which unnerves Laurel a little. But overall, Laurel is much more excited and happy due to her relationship than she has been in a long time.How can we understand that our partner is an ideal candidate for providing mutual love or unconditional love? If you are always loyal, honest, and supportive with each other and never complain about each other to other people, there is a high probability that you are ideal candidates for mutual or unconditional love. This book shows us the importance of mutual love in our life.