{I've Been Reading} The Boy in the Photo

The Fallen Girls by Kathryn Casey

After learning that one of her half sisters is missing, detective Clara Jeffries returns to the small town where she grew up. Life in Alber, Utah has changed drastically. Clara's mother, Ardeth, and Ardeth's sister wives have moved with their children from the house where Clara grew up into a run down trailer outside of town. They insist that the missing twelve-year-old is on a mission with a family in Salt Lake City, that nothing is wrong. Beyond that, they refuse to speak to Clara at all. But there are other missing girls, from families who insist that they're not missing at all, and a decomposing body is discovered in the cornfield behind the trailer and Clara isn't leaving town without answers.

I absolutely loved this one. I don't usually pick up books where the main character is involved with law enforcement because, somewhere along the line, I got the idea that police procedurals aren't my thing. This book kept me turning pages.  I can't wait for the next book in the series, but since this one was just published today I guess I'm going to have to be patient.




The Boy in the Photo by Nicole Trope

It's been six years since Megan went to pick up her son after school and learned that his father had picked him up earlier in the day. Her ex husband and son are gone and the authorities haven't been able to find a trace of either of them. For all that time, she's been hoping that Daniel will come back to her. Then one day the phone rings.

Daniel has walked into a police station, alone. There was a fire in the isolated shack where he was living with his father and now he's come back to her. The boy is Daniel. They'll do a DNA test to confirm that he's her missing son, but Megan doesn't question it for a moment. Her loving, happy six-year-old son had grown into a sullen, angry twelve-year-old who won't reveal much about the past six years.

This one kept me holding my breath. One of my hunches did turn out to be right, but there were still twists and revelations that I didn't see coming until the end.



One by One by D. W. Gillespie

Behind the wallpaper of the house her family just moved into, a young girl finds a drawing of a stick figure family -- mother, father, son, daughter, dog. Not long after that, the family cat goes missing and an X appears over the family pet in the drawing.

Creepy old houses absolutely appeal to me, especially when there seems to be something sinister and/or ghostly involved. Parts of this book really worked for me, like the "tangle of hallways" and Alice's discovery of an old diary and her fear of reading further. Other parts definitely fell flat.


Disclosure -- The publishers provided me with advance review copies. This post contains affiliate links.