Crash & Burn by, Lisa Gardner

Crash & Burn by, Lisa Gardner

Synopsis from Goodreads:

My name is Nicky Frank. Except, most likely, it isn’t. 

Nicole Frank shouldn’t have been able to survive the car accident, much less crawl up the steep ravine. Not in the dark, not in the rain, not with her injuries. But one thought allows her to defy the odds and flag down help: Vero.

I’m looking for a little girl. I have to save her. Except, most likely, she doesn’t exist. 

Sergeant Wyatt Foster is frustrated when even the search dogs can’t find any trace of the mysterious missing child. Until Nicky’s husband, Thomas, arrives with a host of shattering revelations: Nicole Frank suffers from a rare brain injury and the police shouldn’t trust anything she says.

My husband claims he’ll do anything to save me. Except, most likely, he can’t.

Who is Nicky Frank, and what happened the night her car sailed off the road? Was it a random accident or something more sinister given the woman’s lack of family and no close friends? The deeper Wyatt digs, the more concerned he becomes. Because it turns out, in the past few months, Nicky has suffered from more than one close accident. . . . In fact, it would appear someone very much wants her dead.

This is my life. Except, most likely, it’s not. Now watch me crash and burn

My Review:

Man alive this woman knows how to write a I can't put this down, edge of my seat thriller. I devoured this book in one day I could not stop reading.

This book once again features Tessa Leoni and Wyatt and also features DD Warren in an interesting side story which makes me anxious for the next DD book to see where her life goes after this book. We also get an update on Bobby Dodge & Annabelle.

This was such a different story, it kept me guessing even though I was able to figure out a couple things that didn't stop my complete enjoyment of this book.

Is it memory or delusion or a bit of both? What do you do when you can't trust your own mind and what it is telling you about your life? We have a completely and wholly unreliable narrator in Nicky Frank the book starts out with a car crash and her complete belief that a little girl named Vero needs saving and was with her but does Vero even exist? Nicky doesn’t seem to know what is real, what is a memory or is it a delusion, she has had 3 concussions in a short amount of time and her brain is mixed up she keeps looking for the girl Vero is she lost, gone, dead or just a figment of her imagination. Was Nicky her savior or her killer? And what of Nicky’s husband Thomas is he the caring husband he seems to be or is there more behind the 3 “accidents” that have happened to Nicky, her car crash being just the latest.

This case starts out with a bang and gets weirder and weirder and poor Wyatt can’t seem to make heads or tails out of the information he is being given by Nicky while he investigates her car accident. Hopefully Tessa can help him out but she seems a little on edge and won’t tell Wyatt what is going on however they do work well together as they did on the last case that they have to put their personal feelings aside to try to get to the bottom of this very odd case. They even bring DD in to help them out.

This book will grab on and not let you go but that’s okay, just hang on, and enjoy the ride. Lisa Gardner does it again with another fantastic thriller!

5 Stars

What She Left Behind, by Ellen Marie Wiseman

What She Left Behind, by Ellen Marie Wiseman

Available on Library2Go in Ebook And in-house

Description from Goodreads: In this stunning new novel, the acclaimed author of THE PLUM TREE merges the past and present into a haunting story about the nature of love and loyalty—and the lengths we will go to protect those who need us most.

Ten years ago, Izzy Stone’s mother fatally shot her father while he slept. Devastated by her mother’s apparent insanity, Izzy, now seventeen, refuses to visit her in prison. But her new foster parents, employees at a local museum, have enlisted Izzy’s help in cataloging items at a long-shuttered state asylum. There, amid piles of abandoned belongings, Izzy discovers a stack of unopened letters, a decades old journal, and a window into her own past.

Clara Cartwright, eighteen years old in 1929, is caught between her overbearing parents and her love for an Italian immigrant. Furious when she rejects an arranged marriage, Clara’s father sends her to a genteel home for nervous invalids. But when his fortune is lost in the stock market crash, he can no longer afford her care—and Clara is committed to the public asylum.

Even as Izzy deals with the challenges of yet another new beginning, Clara’s story keeps drawing her into the past. If Clara was never really mentally ill, could something else explain her own mother’s violent act? Piecing together Clara’s fate compels Izzy to re-examine her own choices—with shocking and unexpected results.

Illuminating and provocative, WHAT SHE LEFT BEHIND is a masterful novel about the yearning to belong—and the mysteries that can belie even the most ordinary life.

My Review:

Wow, just, wow, this book is great! I wasn’t expecting so many holding my breath moments. It always fascinates and horrifies me to learn of the treatment in some of these so called hospitals and the reasons so many women were put into these places. Poor Clara all she did was fall in love with a man her father didn’t approve of so she was locked up and lied about and left there with no-one to turn to, in 1929 this was okay for a father to do to his child. Clara starts out in a little better place at least she had one nice nurse but when the crash hits and her father can no longer pay the bill Clara ends up in Willard hospital a state run home that is an awful, awful place!  In the present day we have Izzie, she is a foster child whose mother is in prison for killing her father her foster parents are doing a project on Willard for the local museum and when Izzie finds Clara’s diary she becomes fascinated with learning more about this woman. Both of these stories are interesting Clara’s more so but there are parts of Izzie’s story that will break your heart too.

This book grabbed me right from the beginning and didn’t let go till the end it was never boring and there were times I was yelling at my ipod because of things that happened to Clara and Bruno. I was surprised at how invested I got in these characters and that there were some really intense scenes I wasn’t expecting.  

Loved the ending …Oh Clara!

If you are a fan of The Vanishing Act of Esme Lennox I’d say to give this one a try, you won’t be disappointed.

5 stars