Good as Gone by Amy Gentry

My rating: 4 of 5 stars


This is one of the more realistic “innocent girl is kidnapped and held captive” plot lines because not only does the author flesh out a disturbing narrative of lost identity, shame, grief and the consequences of the decisions we make, but all of the characters are incredibly flawed and at times behave in a questionable fashion. What’s more realistic than that?

Once this story got going, I needed to figure out what the hell really happened and who the hell Julie/Gretchen/Starr/Violet etc. really was. And typically I poo poo the alternating between first person and third person writing style, but for this novel it not only worked, it was almost a necessity. I also enjoyed “Julie’s” story being told backwards as it played out like a gripping countdown to the big reveal.

And speaking of the ending, it didn’t BLOW me away (the final chapter anyway), but I did appreciate the backstory explaining why everything occurred the way it did. So many authors are content leaving their reader to just accept that X happened “because I said so”. Or worse yet, half assed-ly (is that a word?) coming up with a random and nonsensical curve ball, throw away explanation. Thank you, Amy Gentry, for not doing that.

While this narrative wasn’t perfect and did selectively choose to ignore some major plot points - I’m talking to you Julie, who’s face is on every billboard in town, yet still manages to live out on the street for years (?) without being discovered, and you, simple DNA testing that for some reason was never done - it’s one of the better suspense novels to grace my reading list lately. Which is a relief considering I was starting to think I just hated everything and should really take up a new hobby...




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