Don't Try To Find Me - Holly Brown

Ali Mark
Jan 14, 2016
3 min read

Published in 2015.

Pages: 384.

Number of books by author: 7 Novels.

Genre: Fiction.

Everything seems normal from the outside looking in. But what happens when appearances crumble down around a missing child, who seemingly doesn't want to be found and has taken every preventative measure to ensure she isn't?

You may like this book if you like the following sub-genres:

Realistic Fiction
Family Life
Child Abduction
Sexual/Domestic Violence

Goodreads users gave this book a 3.38. I think it was more deserving of a 4.00.

This book was a random pick off the shelf for me out of the fiction section. And it was the title that drew me in. I didn't anticipate reading about a runaway/missing child in the way that I did, but the old adage "don't judge a book by its cover," doesn't apply. I definitely judged the book by its cover; and it lived up to its expectations, as well as the

name. The title of a book can be in one of three categories: it makes it, it breaks it, or it's irrelevant (which is almost as bad as the latter). Had this book had a different title, or a different explanation on the back, I don't know that I would've picked it up. It felt mysterious and intriguing, but I also didn't think I was jumping into a Nicholas Sparks drama, either. I felt I was going to embark on a real event, so to speak.

Not knowing prior to reading (because I like to avoid the "about the author" nonsense to prevent preconceived notions of a new author's work) that the author has some background in psychology, I originally worried that I was going to get a less-than-qualified sense of what goes on when parents have a missing child, and when they take the route of a media-search. (And I am only as educated as Criminal Minds and SVU; however, these bring in professionals and I trust the implications they make when they write up the scripts.) But the author nailed it - parents often turn on one another when a child goes missing on the others' watch; or when the other parent sees the missing child just an hour or two prior to their disappearance. The author really honed in on what it must feel like from all ends - from the detectives' view of these two very different personalities in parenthood (and in life in general); from the over-attached psychologist's perspective on what this all means; and more importantly, on the parents view looking inwards and out and how they play off one another in a media frenzy.

The book was unexpected, all the way around. I didn't anticipate there'd be a perspective from both the mother and daughter, and I don't always like the way in which that's done, but it was less bothersome for me. I think it was done tastefully, and not overly obvious that one was trying to be a 40-year old woman and the other a 14-year old girl. It just felt natural; as if I was watching two parties share their perspective, which was obviously the authors' intentions. More importantly, the ending felt unexpected. I truly felt that this was going to end in some sort of colossal mess, but I was pleased with how the author ended things and how fight-or-flight and a past with therapy sessions probably influenced that process (and I think it was well thought into how the character responded).

And finally - the depth of the characters. When you deal with something like this, you're evaluating a day-by-day experience in a close-knit group - the publicist, the police officer who is leading the case, the two parents, the child, and the child's closest friends come into play. But with each character, two things happened - we saw development from their basic description, to who they actually are when the cameras are off so to speak; and we saw growth in the primary characters - for one reason or another. And I don't mean growth in, "Oh, she grew up to be such a lovely girl," or "He grew as a man when he broke down in tears." I'm talking growth as a person, with progress and set backs and all kinds of stages in between. This was a shit-show, but it was a well-done shit-show.