What Happens Next by Christina Suzann Nelson

 

Popular podcaster and ex-reporter Faith Byrne made a name for herself telling stories of greatness after tragedy--but her real life does not mirror the stories she tells. While her daughters spend the summer in Hawaii with her ex-husband and his new wife, she must manage life on her own. All of that changes when she's asked to spotlight her childhood best friend's missing person case on her podcast.

Dora Crane has never accepted that her younger daughter could be dead, keeping her home looking the same as when her daughter disappeared. But when her husband leaves her and her older daughter intervenes, she agrees to counseling and to pack up her missing daughter's belongings under one condition: Faith Byrne comes to Deep Valley and sheds light on the cold case.

As the long-abandoned investigation moves forward, old wounds and long-buried secrets are exposed. Will these two women, whose lives have never been the same, finally get the answers they need to reconcile the past and the future?

Review:

When you first pick up this book and look at the cover, questions enter your mind. 

"Did a child find a fishing hole and scamper off, leaving this bike on the trail? Are they off on a fun adventure?"

or something more sinister? 

"Did something happen that forced this child's trike to be left, forgotten and abandoned, on this desolate trail?"

 

The cover reflects the story well. There are so many questions that beg to be answered through these pages… mysteries and secrets long held in the darkened silence. This book is a tear-jerker, but hope for something better keeps you turning the pages. It is a story of loss and redemption, but overall that grief, no matter how terrible, can be overcome. You will experience every emotion in this book, so make yourself and bracing cup and tea and settle in for a read you won't want to stop.

 

Thank-you to Graf Martin for a copy of this book.