This book has all the ingredients for a fantastic read. Margo travels back to her small, quaint village to help her father after an injury. Whilst there she finds that her best friends body has been discovered after 15 years. We are submerged into what feels like a high school drama including cheerleaders, school bullies, the teacher everyone is crushing on and the nerds turned success stories. We are taken on a bit of a rollercoaster (think Peppa pig land not white knuckle) to a very predictable end. My main issue with the book is it’s surprisingly lengthy for a high school mystery and even with the shocking length it just ends.

Completely all of a sudden we’re done and there are still lots of questions that I have!!!

⭐️⭐️

Not you normal missing child story. This is a missing school girl mystery with a few astonishing twists you don’t expect during the two timelines and you are completely immersed in both and I didn’t want it to end. Sold writing, solid plot, solid four stars!

Ah, who does not love small town vibes? Home to friendly folks, picturesque scenery and murder? What?😲

Margo has not been back to her hometown since her good friend Jessie disappeared 15-years ago. Margo is now having to face the painful childhood memories of May 26th, 2004, because Jessie's body has been recently found in Lake Moss. While back home, Margo teams with her old school friend Austin to search for missing clues about the case. Austin is in town filming a documentary called "Into Thin Air" featuring facts about Jessie's 15 year disappearance and murder. However, Margo and Austin soon discover some of the local residents do not welcome old secrets coming to light.

This book has a large cast of characters but do not let that deter you. You can easily sort them all out. The author starts off with a very strong intriguing beginning. The middle is a bit slower getting into some town "he said, she said", but the ending is a mind-blowing plot twist that will leave you reeling!

"When She Disappeared" will be published March 3, 2022.

Thank you NetGalley and Avon Books UK, for allowing me to review this thrilling e-book. I appreciate it very much.

This book had such strong potential but definitely left me wanting. I figured out what really happened to Jesse within the first few chapters, and also plot holes left me wondering why? Like the police and her dad? What? Not the best thriller.

This is a creepy and heart stopping mystery thriller I could not put down. I have read many books with the same premise and for me it was one of the better ones. This book had me reading late into the night. I did guess who the killer was but in no way did it detract from my reading pleasure. A really good read.
Many thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for the ARC in return for giving an honest review.

I previously enjoyed The Family Tree by these authors and was looking forward to reading When She Disappeared. Margo returns to Lake Moss where she grew up to help her father after surgery. Lake Moss was also the place where her mother died in a car crash and where her friend Jessie mysteriously disappeared fifteen years previously. Upon returning she learns that Jessie’s body has been found. It immediately throws her life into turmoil. Trying also to cope with a divorce it almost becomes too much and her childhood nightmares return. She meets up with Austin Hughes, a schoolgirl crush of hers who is back making a programme about missing people. They pool their resources and begin to interview those who were around Jessica when she disappeared. A web of secrets and lies are gradually revealed, culminating with a massive twist. I enjoyed the different characters and the images of how teenagers behave towards one another but felt it dragged a little and seemed to go round in circles. The ending, while explaining what happened, left too much unanswered for my liking and seemed a little rushed compared to the rest of the book. However, a decent enough story that certainly makes you want to discover the truth.

Thank you NetGalley and Avon books for a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.
You know those kinds of thrillers that make you conscious that you are the only one in the room, this was it.
It excited me.
And at some point, I was confident that I knew who the killer was but I was wrong. This book was written well and it is enjoyable.

When She Disappeared is a gripping thriller with plenty of unexpected twists and an explosive ending. I was completely convinced that I knew who the murderer was and that I'd be disappointed that I had figured out the big twist so early on - I was very wrong! When She Disappeared follows Margo, who comes back to her home town after over a decade away to take care of her father. Upon returning home, the body of one of Margo's former classmates, who disappeared 15 years ago, is discovered. Margo inserts herself into the investigation, interviewing past classmates and others who may have known Jessie. The dialogue throughout the book is a bit forced, but other than that, the book is well-written and well-paced. I will definitely recommend When She Disappeared to anyone looking for a can't-put-down thriller/mystery.

Margo is returning to her hometown to help her father after surgery. At the same moment, her best friend's body is discovered after she disappeared and everybody thought that she ran away. Margo is going to look into her death. I did not like Margo much, she feels like a failure because she is divorced 🙄, why a failure???
Thanks to NetGalley for this book.

Some secrets are best left buried. Margo returns to her home town, after a failed marriage. Her return is marked by the auspicious discovery of a clsssmate who had disappeared years before.
The cobwebs of the past are swept away as a podcast probe unravels the sordid secrets. Margo also discovers some painful truths about her family.
The ending is a stunner. I marveled at how well everything came together. The ending alone is a showstopper.

4 ⭐️

I really enjoyed the storyline and how it tied in with a true crime podcast. It gave me “the night swim” vibes by Megan Goldin. I thought i had the “who done it” figured out, was even kinda impressed with myself because I was putting together tiny clues throughout the book and than the last couple pages said “ha fooled you”. The ending however left me wanting more and I am not a fan of that. Like is there going to be a second book?! Probably not so why leave us all hanging like that. I am not one that can leave it up to my imagination but it is a good ploy by the authors because now I’ll be thinking about their book for a while.

Steph Mullin & Nicole Mabry if you’re seeing this can you personally send me an ending ;) but in all seriousness this was my first book by the authors and I’ll be sure to pick up another!

Thank you #netgalley for this advanced copy

After reading The Family Tree by Steph Mullin & Nicole Mabry I immediately came on Goodreads to see if they had any other books. Which led me to When She Disappeared on Netgalley.

Margo has returned home to Lake Moss after a messy divorce to help her father recover from surgery. Her first day back Jessie, her best friend who has been missing since 2004 is found in a local watering hole.

When Margo reconnects with her high school crush, who's now working for an ID channel type show, they start working together to figure out who killed Jessie.

When She Disappeared was so well done! I had so many suspects I was sure were the murderers throughout the book but definitely did not see that ending coming! Not only were the twists well done, this thriller also creeped me out, which I enjoy in thrillers.

I can't wait to see what these authors write next!

This was one of my most anticipated reads for 2022, and it lived up to the hype. While I didn't like it as much as The Family Tree, it still hooked me in right from the start & didn't let go until the last page. There were so many unlikeable & unreliable characters, it made it hard to know who was telling the truth about the last time they saw Jessie. There's lots of twists & secrets revealed as Margo works with a documentary crew who is revisiting the case now the Jessie's body has been found. With many people having a motive for killing Jessie, I could not pick who did it - I had an inkling, but I was wrong & shocked! I liked the ending even though I wanted a definitive answer - was justice going to be served or would the killer get away with it?

When She Disappeared is set in a small town, which like all gatherings of humanity, has plenty of secrets. The novel has a "cold case” gets hot again storyline, but with a more contemporary twist in that, after fifteen years, a true crime show takes up the case and stirs up the pot. Back then, Jessie, a beautiful high school student disappears. Everyone seems to have an alibi, and the case rather quickly turns cold.

The main character, Margo, left the area way back then and has returned for two reasons: her divorce and her father needing care after hip surgery. When she reunites with Austin, her former high-school lab partner, who is now working for the television show. With that action, she moves into the cross-hairs of the various unreliable and unlikeable potential suspects.

The story is told in Margo’s point of view and includes epistolary chapters taken from the diary she kept as a teenager. There is a clever twist at the rather open-ended conclusion.

When She Disappeared had everything I usually love in a book, a small town, hidden secrets, an unsolved crime and trying to figure out who committed the crime (it even has a murder board!). I just don't think that it totally meshed together and the book fell a bit flat for me.

I will say that the authors did create a great small town vibe, where everyone knew everyone and the gossip was all over the place. They further were able to create some good spooky or creepy vibes too, which was a great atmosphere to be reading. But that just couldn't hold me and keep me invested.

I found that there were lots of clues about who did it, and easily figured it out. I also felt like the clues were a little spoon-fed to me. In a mystery/thriller I'm generally okay if I figure out the story or plot points, but I like there being one "gotcha" moment for me, and this book just didn't have any for me. I also found that there were a lot of things that happened in the book, likely as red herrings, that didn't amount to anything or were just forgotten.

Most of the characters in this book were pretty miserable or terrible too. So many of the peers that Margo went to high school with seem miserable now and haven't really even grown up. I found, to often, there were to many conversations and stories that didn't move the plot forward either. It just wasn't fast paced enough for me.

This was a well written book, but it just did not work for me. Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for an advance copy of this book in exchange for an open and honest review. All opinions are 100% mine.

I really enjoyed this crime novel/thriller. At the start it went along the well-worn lines of young woman, Margo, comes back to the small town that she has avoided for many years after her best friend, Jessie, went missing. She was bullied at school, everyone in the town has secrets. As she arrives in town, Jessie’s body is found, and what was originally seen by the police as a teenage runaway, turns into a murder investigation. But what sets it apart from most, is first the excellent writing style, and secondly the investigation is not done by the police, but by a TV documentary team, who had originally covered Jessie’s disappearance, and now want an update as new information comes to light.
Preparation for the documentary is being handled by sound technician, Austin, who had also grown up in the town. He enlists Margo’s aid, as she knew Jessie very well, and worked as a court stenographer, so was good at taking notes. Their (and most other people’s) main suspect is Charlie, who had been Jessie’s boyfriend. Charlie is from a wealthy family, entitled, arrogant and a major bully who had made Margo’s school life torture. You so want Charlie to be the murderer.
However, it soon becomes apparent, that popular girl, Jessie, had rubbed nearly everyone in town up the wrong way at some time or other. Although many of the complaints against her would not necessarily have been motive enough for murder (in a rational world), almost everyone’s life was improved by not having Jessie in it.
Someone wants Margo to stop asking questions. There are threatening emails, and someone might be spying on her at her home. In the book there are chilling scenes where Margo sees a flicker of movement out the corner of her eye. Is it a stalker? Or is she imagining it?
Margo’s mother had been very paranoid and overprotective of her daughter, before dying in a car crash (accident or suicide?). Has Margo inherited her paranoia?
“There was a physical piece of evidence sitting in front of her. But it had been real to her mother too. Was the danger real, or all in her head? Was her mind inventing a perceived threat, filling in blanks of its own accord?”
There is a major twist at the end that I did not fully see coming (though I had suspected everyone at one time or another) – and although we finally know what happened to Jessie, the book ends on a cliff hanger, as the town remains in ignorance – or does it?
This was an excellent read – fast paced and has you on the edge of your seat. It would make a really exciting TV series. I recommend it to all crime/thriller fans.

A story full of intrigue and suspense. Keeps you guessing throughout the book. I had about 3 suspects that I thought might have killed Jessie, and thankfully I had one right!!
Certainly an easy book to follow - it's the kind of book I could see being turned into a film.

This is one of those rare books where the characters grip you from page 1. Gripping and intense, this book sucks you in. Through twists, turns and suspense galore. This book casts a spell and keeps you reading and turning pages. I adored the writing, the characters and the pace of this book. The whole vibe was amazing. I was sad when I finished it. A must read

Thank you to NetGalley for providing a digital advanced reader copy of this book. The opinions expressed below are my own and were not requested or required.
Margo comes back to her hometown to help her father while he recovers from knee surgery. The day she arrives, the body of a girl who has been missing since 2004 is discovered. This is Margo's childhood best friend, Jessie, who everyone thought ran away. Austin, one of Margo's only friends from high school is also back in town to film an update on a rebooted series "Into Thin Air" about Jessie's disappearance and the discovery of her body, in hopes to solve the case. This part reminds me of the Mary Higgins Clark and Alafair Burke series Under Suspicion
This book is not fast paced, at times, it wasn't holding my attention. I felt the chapters were really long and there was a little too much going on in the book. Too much background or too much going on between Margo and Austin that this was more of a light romance then a mystery/thriller. Margo keeps getting threats from an anonymous user through Facebook and Instagram. She is also getting calls from unknown caller. Which does add a layer of mystery, but again, not enough to keep me from wanting to put it down. I kept waiting for the "stalker" to make his move and give us a blow-out of an ending. That being said, the last chapter, I couldn't put down, I was surprised to find out what really happened to Jessie, but it wasn't the big "on the edge of my seat" moment that I was anticipating.

Margo is returning home to Lake Moss to look after her dad, who is recovering from an operation. She left when her friend went missing - 15 years ago - and as she returns a body is found.
She meets an old school friend who is part of a documentary team looking into the way the police dealt with the case . She revisits her old diary and tries to face the past.
But the killer is still out there!!

Keeps you guessing to the last page and then Wow!!!