Book Review: Then She Was Gone

Then She Was Gone, A Haunting Thriller

If you’ve read many of our book reviews, you may have noticed we love reading good thrillers. On that note, Then She Was Gone by Lisa Jewell fits that desire perfectly. Indeed, this novel is a suspenseful thriller that had us dangling from the edge of our seats.

Then She Was Gone is Akin To The Novel The Lovely Bones

If you’ve read The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold or watched the film based on the book, the feel of this novel is similar in that eerie—I want to look away, but I can’t—kind of way.

Ellie Mack is whom every teenage girl wants to be and the kind of kid every mother of a teenage daughter wants to have. Although Ellie might be a little precocious (what teenager isn’t?), she is nearly perfect in every way. She even has an equally perfect first boyfriend. And the two of them are lovely people, which makes everything all the more ideal.

Then one day, Ellie is suddenly gone, and no one knows why. Where has she disappeared? Has she run away? Did someone kidnap her? Is she still alive? And how can her family pick up the pieces after she’s gone?

Ten years later, still shattered and blown apart by Ellie’s absence, her family is trying to move on without her in their separate ways. Laurel Mack, Ellie’s mother, has even met a man and, to her surprise, is interested in seeing more of him. But things become strange when Laurel meets his young daughter who looks and acts like Ellie.

Is it just Laurel’s imagination or a desire to find Ellie in someone else? Or is there something more sinister at play?

Discover the answers to these questions as well as what happens to Ellie’s sister, father, and that perfect boyfriend she had.

We think Then She Was Gone is a must-read!

Then She Was Gone Publisher Synopsis

Ellie Mack was the perfect daughter. She was fifteen, the youngest of three. Beloved by her parents, friends, and teachers, and half of a teenaged golden couple. Ellie was days away from an idyllic post-exams summer vacation, with her whole life ahead of her.

And then she was gone.

Now, her mother Laurel Mack is trying to put her life back together. It’s been ten years since her daughter disappeared, seven years since her marriage ended, and only months since the last clue in Ellie’s case was unearthed. So when she meets an unexpectedly charming man in a café, no one is more surprised than Laurel at how quickly their flirtation develops into something deeper. Before she knows it, she’s meeting Floyd’s daughters—and his youngest, Poppy, takes Laurel’s breath away.

Because looking at Poppy is like looking at Ellie. And now, the unanswered questions she’s tried so hard to put to rest begin to haunt Laurel anew. Where did Ellie go? Did she really run away from home, as the police have long suspected, or was there a more sinister reason for her disappearance? Who is Floyd, really? And why does his daughter remind Laurel so viscerally of her own missing girl?

Author Bio:

Lisa Jewell is the #1 New York Times bestselling author of nineteen novels, including The Family Upstairs and Then She Was Gone, as well as Invisible Girl and Watching You. Her novels have sold over 5 million copies internationally, and her work has also been translated into twenty-eight languages.

Then She Was Gone FAQ

Image at top of this feature is by Angelo Pantazis on Unsplash

Thanks for visiting!

Two Dog Review

We write honest reviews on books, products, and travel. We hope you find our site useful.

Two Dog Review is named for our two Goldendoodle dogs pictured here. As a result, they appear in many of our article photos and Instagram posts and are the site’s official mascots.

TDR