I almost DNF'd this one, and I'm still surprised I didn't. I was waiting for this book to get to the actual mystery of Dara's disappearance. I thought most of the book would be about Nick's search for her sister and how her sister's disappearance is connected to Madeline's. Turns out most of the book focused on the animosity between the two sisters and we don't begin to see the mystery until the last 1/3 of the book. Then when we finally do unravel the mystery, it ends up being a big disappointment. The climax was very underwhelming and I was bored throughout most of this book. The twist wasn't bad, but unfortunately it's been done before and done much better. If you're expecting a fast-paced mystery/thriller, this book is not it. ( )

A great read/listen, with lots of surprises, interesting characters, and good narration. Recommended.

FROM PUBLISHER: Dara and Nick used to be inseparable. But that was before the accident that left Dara's beautiful face scarred and the two sisters totally estranged.

When Dara vanishes on her birthday, Nick thinks Dara is just playing around. But another girl, nine-year-old Madeline Snow, has vanished, too, and Nick becomes increasingly convinced that the two disappearances are linked.

Now, Nick has to find her sister—before it's too late.

In this edgy and compelling novel, Lauren Oliver creates a world of intrigue, loss, and suspicion as two sisters search to find themselves, and each other. ( )

Another awesome guy in a Lauren Oliver book! It's like Kent all over again.

Nick and her sister Dara used to be as close as sisters could be. But that was until the boy next door and a terrible accident got between them. Now, even though they live together, they're completely separate, painstakingly moving around to avoid one another. Nick was always the caretaker, always cleaning up Dara's messes and covering for her. Dara was the whirlwind, causing mayhem and chaos wherever she went. After the accident, they've both had to re-evaluate who they are.

When a young girl disappears, Nick is drawn to the mystery. And when Dara disappears too, Nick can't help but feel they are linked in some way.

My Thoughts:
Another fab book from Lauren Oliver!! I'm new to the Lauren Oliver party, but I can't get enough of this author's writing. I find it so addicting and beautiful and easy. There's nothing about her storytelling that I don't like. I'm so happy I decided to read this book as I felt like I was going through a reading slump, and this pulled me right out of it. I couldn't put it down.

Having said all that, there was something that I didn't like about it. The twist. I'm not going to be spoilery and tell you anything about the twist except that it's been pulled on me one too many times. I knew right away what it was going to be, and I found it obvious. Now, I can't tell if it was obvious because like I said, it's been done to me too much, or if it was obvious because Lauren Oliver was being Captain Obvious... but either way, I knew. The thing is, that didn't detract me from having a great time reading the book and falling in love with the story because there were a lot of other things to find out.

My favorite part of the book: Parker. The boy in the house the next street over was so adorable and lovable, and he was the reason I was so hooked on the book. I really really wanted to know what would happen with him and whoever in the romance department. Every time there was a scene with him in it, I had this ache in the pit of my stomach for the pain that teenage love is.

Dara was tough for me. She's so frustrating at times, but I could totally relate to her as well. As a person I tend to be that whirlwind tornado that loses things, breaks things, leaves messes, borrows and doesn't return... and not just with inanimate objects. Not that I don't have good intentions, I just rarely ever have it together. So while I felt bad for Nick for always having to be her sister's savior, I also know what it's like to be on the other side. (Shoutout to my mom for always being my savior & cleaning up my messes, figuratively and otherwise... oh, and I'm sorry). In a way, even though Dara sometimes made me want to hit the ceiling, she also held up a mirror to myself in how I've acted in the past. It was a weird realization.

Can we talk about FanLand? FanLand (proper name: Fantasy Land, which really does sound like a strip club), is this amusement park where Nick and Parker work for the summer. I can't even explain how much I loved having FanLand in this book. There's not a lot of old-school indie amusement parks left, but there's 2 of these in Pittsburgh; Kennywood and Idlewild (although both were bought by an amusement park corporation in recent years, the traditional feel of the parks remains). FanLand reminded me of everything that's good about those places. Thank you Lauren Oliver for picking such a cool place for Nick to work. And for making her coworkers such oddball characters, I loved them.

As a bonus: There were a bunch of pictures scattered throughout the book, and while interesting, I didn't really get what exactly they added to the story except to make it more real feeling? It was something different if nothing else, but I could have taken or left them. There are also tons of other media thrown in... emails, diary entries, patient files, online articles, police blotter, etc. I loved what that brought to the book. Those extra things made the book feel 10x more real than the pictures did.

So, should you read this book?? I would totally recommend. It's a fun mystery even if you do figure out the twist, there's a few other question marks that will keep you reading, and the writing is very addicting. It's sad without being a sobfest, it's haunting without being overly dramatic. If you like Lauren Oliver, read this book!

OVERALL: A cool mystery that didn't exactly fool me on the twist. Other than that, I loved everything else this book gave me. It was beautifully written, full of interesting characters, a really cool setting, and so many issues. I definitely recommend.

Quote: "Here's what nobody tells you: 90 percent of the time, when you fall in love, somebody gets burned." ~Dara

My Blog:

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This is definitely Oliver's best book since Before I Fall, and I had trouble putting it down.

This was a mystery, a thriller, and a book with some psychological elements all mixed in. It had an exciting plot with quite a few threads going on that tied together quite nicely.

My favourite aspect of this book was the tension and the creepiness that hovered over me the whole time I was reading it. Even when I was lying on the grass reading it in the sun, I felt like there was a cloud hanging over me and tension was consuming me--there was just the aura that something bad was around every corner.

It actually reminded me from the first few chapters of Ellen Hopkins' Identical and because of that perhaps this book was less intense than it could have been.

The way Oliver weaved Nick's point of view in with newspaper articles, diary entries, text messages, chapters from the past, and other various pieces was very clever and well organized, adding without being distracting.

I really loved Nick. Even though I kept thinking she was Parker due to my horrible memory for names mixed with the stereotypically male nickname for Nicole. She was really well rounded, and though people--Dara especially--thought she seemed perfect, it was very apparent that there were cracks and that she herself could see them.

Some scenes, once knowing everything, were incredibly perfect and used the very clever diction I admire Oliver for.

Oliver has crafted a really clever book and while it was nowhere as strong as her writing in Before I Fall, I'm excited to see what she comes up with next. ( )

This book did the unreliable narrator POV really well. I suspected early on, what was going on, but -how- it was confirmed still surprised me. Such a complex mental illness is hard to treat, let alone write about in a YA novel. The author's angle on the illness was--eh. I've seen shockingly offensive portrayals, shock value ones, but no attempts to treat the illness with respect. I think the author was trying, and I also think she knew she was writing it in a certain way. ( )