What Was Lost
What Was Lost, by Catherine O’Flynn, is another one of those books that I mysteriously found on my bookshelves while I was looking for something new to read. It’s got a nice cover, it’s not too thick, and the blurb on the back mentions a girl who works in a record store — sign me up! Not to mention that it won the Costa First Novel Award.
The book starts with the story of Kate Meaney, a young English girl who fancies herself a detective and keeps a notebook of her observations around her neighborhood. She mysteriously vanishes sometime around 1984, and the book skips ahead to 2003 and picks up with two seemingly unrelated characters, Lisa (who works at the record shop in Green Oaks mall) and Kurt (who works security at Green Oaks mall). My linear-thinking brain stumbled a little bit with this disconnected transition, but O’Flynn’s writing style is so easy, I was able to keep going and pick up where she did.
The book goes on to delve deeper into Lisa’s and Kurt’s current goings-on, as well as their pasts, and how they both might in some way have a connection to Kate — the little girl who had vanished twenty years earlier. And other facts are weaved into the story that cast doubt on the guilt of Adrian, the shopkeeper’s son who was the last person seen with Kate, who fled into hiding when suspected of kidnapping her (or worse). Ultimately, the present-day characters in the book become amateur detectives (mirroring young Kate’s aspirations) in their efforts to solve the mystery.
Overall a pretty easy read, and a fairly satisfying one.
October 9, 2008 1:05 pm 1 Comment
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By Sarah, October 9, 2008 @ 9:29 pm
I thought this book was great, but it hasn’t gotten much press over here, which is a shame.