This is the third of Wendy Walker’s psychological thrillers that I’ve read and I feel like with each book, the way she crafts her stories gets better and better. Oftentimes with this genre, it can be quite difficult to come up with a fresh story that doesn’t feel like it’s been done before, but with her books, Walker consistently manages to come up with a story that is not only unique, but also creative as well as intricately plotted. What also stands out with her works is that there is substance to the story in the form of specific issues that are being grappled with in society or sometimes a moral dilemma that there is usually no resolution for. A lot of thrillers simply entertain and end up being forgettable afterwards – but Walker’s books (the 3 I’ve read so far at least) all ended up giving me “food for thought” on certain issues, which is actually what I hope to get from all my reading experiences.
This time around, with Don’t Look For Me, Walker presents us with another strong but flawed female protagonist in Molly Clarke, whose family is still shattered by a tragedy that occurred 5 years ago. After a particularly devastating argument with her eldest daughter Nichole, Molly decides to make the 4 hour drive across town to visit her son Evan at his school. On her way home, she is caught in the middle of a storm with her car dangerously low on gas. Hours later, her car would be found abandoned by the side of the road, with her cell phone left in the charging dock. A few days later, a note would be found at a nearby hotel – a note signed by Molly, containing an apology to her family and requesting that they don’t look for her. Based on this, the case is closed, with the assumption that Molly decided to “walk away” from the aftermath of a tragedy that made her life no longer worth living. All efforts to find her are stopped and her family is advised that this type of thing happens all the time, and that they should find a way to move on with their lives. But did Molly Clarke really just “walk away” to start a new life, not wanting to be found? Or is there something more sinister at play?
Through an alternating timeline -- starting with Molly on the day she disappeared, then 2 weeks later from her daughter Nichole’s perspective – the premise drew me in from the getgo and from there, I found this one hard to put down. Of course, I don’t want to say too much, since the rule of thumb is always to go into these suspense / thriller novels knowing as little as possible. With that in mind, this review will be deliberately brief and vague. One thing I do want to mention is that this story was definitely well-plotted and suspenseful, but in more of a “slow-burn” rather than “action-packed” manner (though this didn’t prevent me from wanting to turn the pages and find out what was coming next). Also, unlike many of the suspense / thrillers I’ve read lately, this one actually kept me guessing from beginning to end, which meant I wasn’t able to figure out the culprit or how things would pan out in the end – definitely a good thing, since a thriller that is “easy to figure out” takes all the “fun” out of reading it. With all that said though, while the “big reveal” at the end was definitely surprising and not at all what I thought it would be, it wasn’t the “jaw-dropping, shocking twist” type of reveal that I had been expecting – in fact, it actually felt a bit anti-climactic for some reason, at least to me. Regardless though, this was still overall a great read. Wendy Walker is absolutely on my short list of “go-to” authors now in terms of psychological thrillers and I look forward to seeing what she has in store for us next. Meanwhile though, I need to find time to squeeze in her backlist books at some point – hopefully sooner rather than later.
Received ARC from St. Martin’s Press via NetGalley.
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