Preview - Then She Was Gone by Lisa Jewell

Then She Was Gone

Lisa Jewell

Copyright 2017

356 Pages

We start this one off on a somber note. A tragic story of a daughter, vanished. At 15, Ellie left for the library and never returned home. Her family, shattered in that uniquely silent way grief tends to settle, never stopped hoping she’d walk back through the door. We get glimpses of Ellie’s life before — GCSE stress, first‑boyfriend butterflies — but the story really follows her mother, Laurel, ten years later, trying to move forward while carrying a daughter‑shaped absence everywhere she goes.

The disappearance left cracks in the family that no amount of time or plaster could fix. Laurel and her husband Paul divorced, though they still orbit each other with a kind of bruised affection. Their other two children grew up, moved out, and built lives of their own. Laurel is left staring at the blank page of her next chapter, pen in hand, unsure what to write.

Enter Floyd, stage left, at a café — charming, attentive, and conveniently a father of two daughters, just like Laurel. His youngest, Poppy, is the spitting image of Ellie, which feels like a cosmic hug and a cosmic punch at the same time. And Floyd? He’s the perfect boyfriend. Says the right things. Does the right things. Practically glows under good lighting.

But listen… perfection is suspicious. Perfection is a plot twist wearing cologne. Something here is off. I can’t quite pin it down yet, and even if I could, I wouldn’t dare spoil it for you. All I know is as I mentally revisit these first few chapters, I’m planting red flags like I’m landscaping a national park.

At this point, I’m convinced we’re aboard the literary Titanic — and we are gliding, full speed, straight toward that iceberg.