Book Review: The Disappearing | Lori Roy

Lori Roy’s The Disappearing is a beautifully-written mystery about the local lore that can haunt a small town and the courage it takes to free a community from their past demons. I loved the gothic atmosphere of this novel, and the way the mystery and town folklore wove through the lives of all who lived there.

About the Book

Lane hasn’t been back to her hometown in Florida for twenty years, when a divorce forces her to move out of New York City and back home to the Fielding Plantation with her two daughters, Talley and Annalee. Lane has a dark past in this town and with her family. Lane and her family are haunted by the demons in their past. Her father Neil had been the director of a school for boys that gained notoriety for the number of boys who went missing from the school.

As a girl, Lane was fixated on the boys who ran. She dreamt of getting out of the town as well, and so she’d leave them food and a note of encouragement that they could make it out, even if she was stuck. Now Lane is grown and she knows better than to believe in the stories of her youth. But when a girl goes missing, she can’t help but wonder if the town is cursed. And then a second girl goes missing, Lane’s elder daughter Annalee. Lane knows that the town hasn’t escaped its demons. Something is wrong and Lane must find her daughter before it’s too late…

Reflection

After reading about the first 10% of this book, I became curious about the author Lori Roy. This isn’t a run-of-the-mill mystery. The writing reads like a gothic novel, and it is so descriptive that I could not only picture the scenes, I could feel them. The hot breath of air on my skin, the cool shiver of goosebumps, the scratch of the tall grass on my ankles. When I looked up Roy, I saw she is a multiple winner of the Edgar Award, and I can see why after reading the way she writes in this book.

This book uses multiple narrators and times. Normally I love this technique, but this book took awhile to allow me to become familiar with the four narrators. It was initially difficult to follow when the narrator and time period changed, but I wonder if it will be easier in the final corrected version of this book (I read an uncorrected proof). I ended up really enjoying each of the four narrators by the end. I particularly connected with Erma, but it was great to hear pieces of the story from Lane and Talley as well.

The very ending moved forward in time. I won’t say much more than that, because I don’t want to spoil anything, but it was such a good ending. I enjoyed what I learned in this epilogue, and it rounded out many loose threads. The ending itself (prior to this point) did lack a bit of a punch, but this book didn’t really rely on twists. It relied on atmosphere and writing and the turmoil of secrets kept for too long.

I read this book with some of my Traveling Sisters, Brenda, Norma, Berit, Mary Beth, and Holly. I loved our discussion! We all had different characters who spoke to us. For me it was the grandmother Erma, but others really enjoyed Talley and Lane respectively. I recommend this book to fans of gothic atmospheres and small-town mysteries.

Many thanks to Dutton Books for my advanced copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.