The Book:
Last Girl Ghosted by Lisa Unger
Published October 5th 2021 by Park Row
Date read: September 22, 2021
The Characters:
Wren
Bailey, the PI
Buy it on Bookshop.org | Amazon
The Plot (from Goodreads):
She met him through a dating app. An intriguing picture on a screen, a date at a downtown bar. What she thought might be just a quick hookup quickly became much more. She fell for him—hard. It happens sometimes, a powerful connection with a perfect stranger takes you by surprise. Could it be love?
But then, just as things were getting real, he stood her up. Then he disappeared—profiles deleted, phone disconnected. She was ghosted.
Maybe it was her fault. She shared too much, too fast. But isn’t that always what women think—that they’re the ones to blame? Soon she learns there were others. Girls who thought they were in love. Girls who later went missing. She had been looking for a connection, but now she’s looking for answers. Chasing a digital trail into his dark past—and hers—she finds herself on a dangerous hunt. And she’s not sure whether she’s the predator—or the prey.
The Twist:
When Wren was a child, her father took their family to go live off the grid somewhere to hide from the government. He was suffering from PTSD from the war and abused her mother and brother. One day Wren called the police on her father, telling them about his stockpile of weapons. When the police came the hill people fought back and many were killed. Wren was presumed dead, but it was actually a different girl in her grave. A cop that found her helped her change her name and hide.
Adam was one of the kids that lived off the grid near Wren’s family. He had figured out that it was Wren who called the police. He found all of his victim’s through Wren’s self-help site.
The Ending:
Wren goes to Adam’s cabin where he had recreated her father’s house. He captures her, intending to kill her like he killed the other missing girls. She kills him to escape.
Wren is pregnant with Adam’s child.
The Review:
Thank you to Berkley and NetGalley for an early ebook copy of Last Girl Ghosted. This book is certainly one that will make you think twice about bringing home your online dates!
I loved the first half of Last Girl Ghosted. Woman gets ghosted by an internet date, only to find out he’s involved in some sketchy stuff? Sign me up! The beginning was extremely suspenseful, and I couldn’t wait to figure out what Adam’s deal was. The second half moved a little slowly and I was a little frustrated by the decisions of some characters, but it was still very enjoyable.
The dual timelines were a great way to tell this story, although I did wish I had a physical copy of the book so I could flip back and remind myself what was going on. Wren’s past was fascinating, and I really enjoyed how it tied in with current events. I’m not sure how I thought about the second-person narrative: I usually don’t like it, but I think it worked in this context to let the reader really get inside Wren’s head. I think I would have liked it even more if I listened to this one as an audiobook.
Overall, this is a suspenseful, fascinating thriller to add to your TBR this October!
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