3 STARS!

I have very mixed feelings about this book. Even though it is pretty short, it took me ages to finish it and I think that that was down to the fact that I didn’t feel any connection to the characters. In short, I thought they were stupid.

They are invited over their neighbour’s house but are asked to leave their six month old baby at home. Their babysitter cancels, so instead of calling the dinner off and staying at home like any sane parents would do, they just leave their baby and stumble drunkenly back to check on her at various points in the night (actually leaving the door open).

When they get back, the baby is gone, surprise surprise. Because of how stupid they were, I couldn’t muster the sympathy intended for them, which meant that I just didn’t really care about them. I felt sorry for the baby for having such idiotic parents!

I didn’t enjoy the writing style. It was first person, present tense, which can work but it just didn’t do it for me this time. A lot of the story was told, not shown.

However, the actual plot, excluding the parents’ actions, I enjoyed. The twists were a-plenty and I didn’t see all of them coming. I think Lapena did a very good job of the mystery aspect and this is a really good first book for her. I will read others by her if she does write more because like I said, the plot was engaging.