4.5 stars

Holy shit. This is a good book.

The book starts off with an accident and then Jenna is running away from all her heartbreak, wanting to make a fresh start where no-one knows her and knows what's she's lost. Ray, a detective, is trying to investigate all the pieces of that night but as the months go in, he starts losing a grip on his family...

This is an amazing, beautifully written and emotional read. I was completely hooked. I really felt for Jenna and loved all the mystery surrounding her life, even though it drove me crazy. I felt like I was pretty sure I knew what I was reading until about 50% through when suddenly it flipped and everything turned much darker and a lot more sinister. From that point, I couldn't put the book down until I had solved everything. This was definitely not one of those books where I guessed what would happen. It really did keep me on the edge of my seat until the very end!

The detective and police work described in this book by Ray and his colleagues felt very authentic to me, and it all made sense when I read the Author's Note and Clare Mackintosh wrote about her years as a police officer and dealing with a similar case as in the book.

The one thing I didn't like was the feelings Ray felt about Kate. They didn't seem entirely solved. I also felt frustrated at him believing his son to be bullied for almost two years, and not bothering to once get into a conversation with him. I also would have liked to have read about Ray's conversation with Tom when they found out the truth. Or something like Ray explaining Jenna's story to Tom and making him realise that he shoudn't want to grow up to be a bully of a man like Ian.