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Product Description: While parked at a gas station, Rhonda sees something so incongruously surreal that at first she hardly recognizes it as a crime in progress. She watches, unmoving, as someone dressed in a rabbit costume kidnaps a young girl. Devastated over having done nothing, Rhonda joins the investigation. But the closer she comes to identifying the abductor, the nearer she gets to the troubling truth about another missing child: her best friend, Lizzy, who vanished years before. From the author of the acclaimed Promise Not to Tell comes a chilling and mesmerizing tale of shattered innocence, guilt, and ultimate redemption. Customer Reviews: Rating: 
Date: 2008-07-03
Great Story!
I really enjoyed this book, I finished it in just two days--it was pretty hard to put down. I read the author's first book as well and will keep an eye out for future books by her. Great read! Rating:
Date: 2008-06-27
Jennifer did it again!
Jennifer pulled me into her new book with the very first page. I couldn't put her book down and was up till the wee hours of the night finishing it. I would HIGHLY recommend her book to everyone. It is captivating, intriguing, thrilling, and mysterious enough to keep you turning the pages. I will be looking forward to her next book S.L. Chessor, author of Poodlums, Boogeymen and Booglers and My Tongue Fell Out.Poodlums, Boogeymen and Booglers: A Poetry CollectionMy Tongue Fell Out
Rating: 
Date: 2008-06-24
Brisk writing...but just TOO MANY coincidences
ISLAND OF LOST GIRLS is one of those books where just a few too many THINGS happen to be credible. I know it's a tough balance to strike...but to me, it must be struck. If a book is clearly meant to be "incredible," then I don't mind plot twists galore...for example, if I'm reading a Robert Ludlum novel, I know he's trying to create a fantasy world (even though it may take place in a recognizable 20th century), and if it doesn't have twists and surprises around every corner, I'll be disappointed.
On the other hand, if the book is clearly trying to be an investigation into the human condition, or put simply, "realistic," than it had better not have one unlikely twist or coincidence after another. I'm perfectly willing to accept a few tragedies or secrets revealed...otherwise, there wouldn't be much point to a work of fiction. But if I get to a point where I'm rolling my eyes and saying, "Oh Lord, not again!" the book has gone off the rails.
ISLAND OF LOST GIRLS begins well enough. We meet Rhonda, a late-20-something single girl, still struggling to find her footing in life (and still struggling a little with her weight). She is carrying a torch, of sorts, for her childhood sweetheart, Peter, who was her best friend Lizzie's brother. Peter has long since married Greta, another childhood acquaintance...but Rhonda appears to be stuck in a state of dazed disappointment over this. Then one day, Rhonda witnesses an unusual event at her local gas station. A young girl is left briefly alone in her car. While the mother is away, another car pulls up and out steps a person in a bunny costume, who easily persuades the girl to go with him. They disappear, and Rhonda realizes, too late, that she has witnessed (and failed to stop) a child abduction.
The small town is mobilized to action, and Rhonda joins in the search, out of guilt for her inaction and also because many years ago, her friend Lizzie also "disappeared." (Coincidence #1?).
This is a decent start to the book. There are LOTS of flashbacks to 1993 (13 years prior), when Peter, Lizzie and Rhonda were entering their teens. We see them during their last summer together before Lizzie's disappearance, and soon it becomes clear that all is not entirely well in their lives or in the lives of their parents.
So the book jumps back and forth. In the present, Rhonda works on the case, and slowly begins to wonder if her old crush Peter might not have had something to do with the current disappearance. After all, when he was younger, his father used to dress up in a bunny suit on Easter and lead the kids on merry chases in the woods. This is the same father who also mysteriously disappeared in the summer of 1993 (more coincidence?).
The book is fairly short, and the writing is brisk and unassuming. I don't mean that in a bad way...it simply tells us what we need to know...mostly from Rhonda's viewpoint, and that's quite fine. It kept my interest.
But as the puzzle is unraveled, the mysteries of 1993 are revealed as well, and at the end, it wants to be....what?....bittersweet?...meaningful? I don't know for certain, because by then, I was just fed up with EVERYONE having a secret! And the climactic scenes are delivered with a bit of "thud." My reaction was, "oh, look, here comes so-and-so to explain everything else in a neat, tidy bundle." I also felt that the missing girl plot was pretty much abandoned 3/4ths of the way through. It may be resolved, but the emotions, the resonances of it were left unfulfilled.
The book showed a lot of promise and was a fast read. Some may have more tolerance than I did for the "piling on" of plot twists. I MIGHT recommend it, but I'd have to know the person first. I can't quite give it a general "thumbs up."
Rating: 
Date: 2008-06-20
Started off good, then went down hill...
This book started off decent. I was enjoying the characters and wondering where the story was going. Then, I started to get annoyed with the characters. Shortly after I figured out exactly where the story was going. The lead, Rhonda is such a weak and annoying character. Actually, most of the characters ended out being annoying and Tock was a bi**h.
I was SO unsatisfied with the ending. I am sorry, but the coincidences were ridiculous.
Rating:
Date: 2008-06-17
So-so read
Read some good reviews but was dissappointed with the story. Not the suspensful page turner I was hoping for. Wouldn't recommend. |
