What She Knew by Gilly Macmillan ~ Book Review

Every parents nightmare.

Rachel is a divorced parent of a sweet 8 year old boy whom she loves dearly.  Though she has had a hard time with the crumbling of her marriage due to an affair on her husband's part she has tried hard to make the best life for her son that she can as she shares him with her ex and his new wife.  She loves him fiercely and would protect him at all costs.  So when they are at a park one Sunday and he asks to run ahead to the swing which is around a bend in a tree'd area, she hesitates but then gives in.  He is eight after all and knows where the swing is.  There is nothing to worry about.  Except when she gets there a minute later he is nowhere to be seen and the swing is swaying and empty.  When she can't find him police are called in and the search begins.  But hours pass and then days and still no sign of Ben.  So when the police ask her to make a scripted plea for Ben's return she agrees.  But when the time actually comes to make the live presentation Rachel totally goes off script and sets up a whole slew of problems for the investigators.  Now the media and public opinion is turned against her from that of sympathy to suspicion.  And everything is suspect.  And Ben still isn't found.  As the investigator works his hardest to try to find Ben so many things just don't add up.

This was a pretty good mystery that kept me guessing.  Many factors come into play and I didn't guess until towards the end.  The story goes back and forth between Rachel's point of view and that of the investigating detective.  Rachel's is first person and some of the detective's story comes out written by a counsellor he is forced to see after the fact because he is having a tough time dealing with the case and it's outcome and his role in it.  I enjoyed the story for the most part though the written record of the counsellor appointments wasn't my favorite method of storytelling and I found this part was a bit dragging for me but that is my preference and no reflection on how well it was or wasn't done.  The one thing I found frustrating was this is a British author, I believe, so all the police officers were referred to as they would be in England.  But the author abbreviated those titles without really defining them so I had to google what they stood for which was maddening.  But once I had them down the story moved at a good pace and kept me interested and engaged the whole time.  Because it was a missing child all the reader's emotions get involved.  It gave us a small glimpse into the many emotions of all those involved in a missing child case.  It also explores the many many assumptions we make when we look at situations through our own emotional pain.    I'd read another from this author.

I gave this an 8.5/10