People have been raving about Laura Lippmann's stand-alones, but I actually prefer her series. However, this one certainly held my interest and was well-plotted, even though I guessed the ending well in advance.

In 1975 two teenage sisters, Sunny and Heather Bethany, disappeared from a Baltimore shopping mall one Saturday afternoon. Despite a lengthy police investigation no trace of the girls was ever found. Their parents, Miriam and Dave, cope as best they can but the event changes the course of both their lives. Fast forward to the present day and, in the aftermath of a car accident, a woman claims that she is the missing Heather Bethany. Due to some inconsistencies in her story and their inability to confirm any of the facts that she gives them, police aren’t convinced she is who she claims to be.

Reading this book was a frustrating experience. As happened when I saw the movie The Sixth SenseI worked out very early on the twist that would come at the end spent the rest of the time wondering why the heck no one else could see it. Most of the time having worked out the end doesn’t impact my enjoyment of a book as there are many other things to occupy my mind: other plot threads, character development and so on. Here though it hindered my reading as I found it quite unbelievable that no one involved in the story ever voiced the possibility that was so blindingly obvious to me. Plots like this rely on keeping the reader guessing and I wasn’t (guessing that is). Every new revelation just cemented what I had already worked out and so I was bored by the chapters focusing on the present day investigation into the woman claiming to be Heather.

On other levels the book worked. I enjoyed the structure of it for example. The criss-crossing between a range of time frames was well done and although it didn’t follow any recognisable pattern it wasn’t confusing. We learned a lot about Heather and Sunny’s childhoods, the lives of their parents following the girls’ disappearance and a little about the woman who may, or may not, be the adult Heather. We also saw glimpses of the people who investigated the case, both at the time of the disappearance and in the present day, although this was by no means a police procedural.

Some of the characters were stunningly developed: in particular Miriam and Dave the parents of the two girls and, for me, the revelation of the various facets of their personalities and lives both before and after the disappearance of their children was the highlight of the book. Lippman portrays two very different ways that people involved in the same horror might deal with it and both are equally credible. When Miriam wonders which event in her life prior to the day of the disappearance she might go back to and change for the entire thing to have been avoided I could feel the genuine agony that thought would cause as it played a never-ending loop in a parent’s mind. The rest of the characters though weren’t nearly as interesting.

Even putting aside the fact I wasn’t terribly engaged by the plot I’m not entirely sure why this book has generated so much awards fuss. For me it was pretty much a middle of the pack read with occasional sparks of real interest

A woman has been involved in an accident and tries to leave the scene. When confronted by the police, she claims to be one of the two Bethany girls who had been kidnapped thirty years ago. Once she makes this claim, she suddenly clams up, forcing a new investigation into the long buried mystery of what actually happened to the girls.

I enjoyed this book. It might not be may favorite book of all time but I adore her writing. I am reading another one of her books at the moment and I am enjoying it more than I did this one. There is something about her writing that keeps me going. Her characters are not the most likable people, but her writing it what sucks you in. I am glad she was recommended on here or I never would have found her. I LOVE this site.

A woman involved in a car accident claims to be Heather Bethany, one of the two teenaged sisters who went missing 32 years earlier. She has credible information, including details not released publicly, but something is amiss, especially because she is reticent to reveal much about her present life. A police officer, Kevin Infante, remains skeptical and sets out, with the assistance of others, to find out the truth. The fact that many of the people who could corroborate “Heather’s” story are dead complicates the investigation.What I enjoyed about the book is that the reader is kept guessing about “Heather’s” identity. The clues are there, but there are also plenty of red herrings. What is also great is that when the revelation comes, everything makes perfect sense. Readers who don’t realize the truth before the reveal will be slapping themselves. The story moves back and forth in time. The details of the investigation are given in the present, but there are flashbacks to the disappearance and to what happened to Dave and Miriam, the grieving parents, afterwards. We get to know most of the characters in detail, including their secrets.For those who enjoy mysteries, I would certainly recommend this book and this author.

Compelling, good paced mystery with well-drawn and fun characters, lots of red herrings and wit. Very good read!

Two sisters are kidnapped from a mall, and 30 years later one of them returns to her hometown--or is she a faker? And to what end? The book is compelling until the very end. The solution is something of a cheat and raises more questions than it answers.

I was a little bit disapointed this story. Lippman didn't tell us characters of Infante, Miriam and Gloria.It's very hard for me to read through this book.

I really enjoyed this book, and I spent a lot of time trying to figure out the riddle. Who is this girl? Is she really Heather? Like other great authors, Lippman doesn't tell until the very very end, and throws in such a twist that you never saw it coming. Absolutley fabulous!

Rare is a book that can make me say I couldn't put it down. Laura Lippman was able to do just that with her compelling novel about the Bethany sisters Heather and Sunny. Her style of switching back and forth not only from character to character point of view but from present to past made for an easy stay on the edge of your seat feel. The only disappointment [if you can even call it such] would have to be the lackluster ending. For a novel that kept you wanting to know what was really going on and what really happened to the Bethany sisters, what was given as an answer left me feeling as though it was a couldn’t think of a better so here you go type ending. All in all I look forward to reading more from Laura Lippman