My Rating: 4 stars
I can't remember the last-time I pulled an "all-nighter" to finish a book that I just couldn't bring myself to put down. Well, that's exactly what I did last night – and the book was Jessica Strawser's debut novel Almost Missed You. From the very first page, I was drawn into the story of Finn, Violet, their son Bear, their friend Caitlin, and the ill-fated vacation that went horribly wrong. With each turn of the page, I was on edge to find out what would happen next.
The premise of the book seemed simple enough : a loving husband and devoted father (Finn) all of a sudden decides to abandon his wife (Violet) on the beach during a family vacation and disappears without a trace, taking their 3 year old son (Bear) with him. The wife is clueless as to what happened until she returns to the hotel room and sees that only her own belongings remain – every single item belonging to her husband and son are gone. From there, we are thrown into a gripping tale of love, betrayal, friendship, forgiveness, and most importantly, the role of fate and its ability to change people's lives forever.
This book is amazingly well-written, which is why I was quite surprised (ok, I guess "shocked" is more like it) to learn that this is the author's first book. The story is tight and the events that unfold are told through the revolving perspectives of the 3 main characters -- Finn, Violet, and their best friend Caitlin – with a timeline that switches back and forth between the present (the incident with Finn abandoning Violet and taking their son) and the past (how Finn and Violet first met and the start of their relationship). Each chapter is written in such a way as to only reveal a few hints, clues, slight details on what possibly motivated Finn to do what he did, with everything eventually coming to a head once the truth is revealed and long-held secrets are finally out in the open. As I was reading, I actually felt like I was working a jigsaw puzzle, with each chapter revealing a new detail in the lives of the characters until ultimately, all the pieces fall into place in a non-traditional sort of way.
My only issue with the book (and the main reason I gave a 4 star rating instead of 5) was the ending, which was a bit too ambiguous in my opinion. While the ending did make sense, especially given the overall theme of fate, coincidence, and missed connections, I wasn't really sure by that time whether I should be happy at the way things turned out or sad at all the sacrifices that were made to get there. And this could just be me, but I kind of sensed that the ending might have hints of a possible sequel, which I hope I'm wrong about because I'm not fond of sequels for one, and two, the story as written is powerful enough as is without need to further complicate things.
This is a great piece of contemporary fiction that is at once engaging, suspenseful, emotional, yet at the same time very much relatable, especially for those who may be going through similar issues in life. Highly recommended!!
Received advance reader's copy from St. Martin's Press via NetGalley (expected publication date: March 28, 2017)
(Read in February 2017)
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