Julia Heaberlin's novels are set in Texas and radiate her attachment to the state and the wide assortment of people who inhabit it. My favorite is still Black-Eyed Susans, but Paper Ghosts is and entertaining puzzle involving Grace, a young woman whose beloved older sister disappeared when Grace was twelve.

Grace has spent the intervening years searching for clues, determined to discover what happened to Rachel. Carl Feldman, a gifted documentary photographer, was once suspected of the murder of several young women across the state. Now, he is an old man who suffers from dementia.

Grace considers Feldman a good possibility to have kidnapped and murdered her sister. She visits the home where he is being cared for claiming to be his daughter. He agrees to accompany her on a road trip to visit the locations of some of his eery photographs. At times, Carl seems a bit lost, at other times, you question the dementia diagnosis and worry about what Grace has gotten herself into. After all, if Carl is guilty, she has put herself in a dangerous situation.

While parts of the narrative are fascinating, there are some slow and repetitive sections as well. From Galveston to Marfa, the two tour the locations of missing women and of many of Carl's photographs.

I liked this novel despite some slow spots and an ambiguous conclusion, in which you learn some answers, but by no means all.

Playing Dead, Black-Eyed Susans, and Paper Ghosts, each have a character with dementia. Since there could hardly be a family in America who hasn't felt the heartache of Alzheimer's or some form of dementia, either within their own family or the families of friends and colleagues--it seems appropriate.

Heaberlin's acknowledgements include interesting personal comments about some of the elements that went into the creation of Paper Ghosts, including the grandfather who shot crime scene photographs; her friend, Texas photographer Jill Johnson; and the eery photographs of Keith Carter.

Read in November; blog review scheduled for April 23, 2018.

NetGalley/Random House/Ballantine

Mystery/Suspense. May 15, 2018. Print length: 368 pages.

Julia Heaberlin takes an interesting approach to a murder novel. Instead of trying to solve the crime from a distance, Heaberlin's main character takes charge and directly confronts the serial killer she believes killed her sister. I will avoid any spoilers, however the ending of this novel felt like the story deflated at the end and tried to wrap up too neatly.

Overall, the characters were well fleshed out. Heaberlin's description of dementia was very accurate. Having lived with a relative with dementia, I appreciated her attempt at portraying the struggles that bystanders may experience when working with someone with dementia. Very few novelists that I have read have discussed this topic. As our population ages, more and more people will encounter someone with depression and it was nice to see this reflected in a novel.

Midway through the novel I became bored with the writing. The story started out strong, however as the novel advances the writing is not as captivating. If I wasn't doing this as a review, I would have more than likely not finished the novel. I hoped that the novel would become more exciting and capture my attention again, but it didn't happen. The ending was not predictable as I thought it would be, but it was a disappointing end all the same. It seems like any novel that has a female lead character and deals with crime is compared to Gone Girl. This is not a novel to compare to Gone Girl. There were many areas of opportunity, but overall the novel was a letdown. I am glad it didn't take me too long to read because I was disappointed at the time I put in with the end result. I wouldn't recommend this novel, there are other crime fiction novels that are much better. The premise is strong, but the delivery just was not there for me.

Please be advised that I received this novel through NetGalley in exchange for a fair review.

Julia Heaberlin’s Paper Ghosts takes us on one of the craziest road trips ever. The narrator doesn’t give her name to us, or anyone else as she goes on the hunt to find out what happened to her missing sister. Rachel was beautiful, exciting and 19 when she vanished on her way to a babysitting gig. Our narrator just 12 at the time has spent her life researching suspects and cases that could be linked to her sister’s abduction. Now 24 she has pinpointed a single culprit, a famed photographer and possible serial killer Carl Feldman. Carl lives in a sketchy halfway house allegedly suffering from dementia. Our narrator poses as his daughter to take him on a vacation, and so begins a road trip that Kerouac would be envious of.
Carl is an enigma. He has moments of clarity, and of caring, mixed with off hand remarks, conversations with imaginary figures that might be ghosts of his victims or figments of a slipping mind. His ability to focus and notice details is more terrifying and intriguing, than his behavior we assume is related to his dementia (even as we question it’s existence). Heaberlin’s character who is both nameless at first but also has many aliases, guides us through her search for her sister, as she tries to pull memories from a mind that is slowly losing them.
Once I started Paper Ghosts, I only stopped reading to sleep for a few hours. It’s original with moments that are scary and funny.

Excellent read. Really kept you coming back and really kept you guessing. I enjoyed every single character including the animals. Good read for sure.

Thanks to the publishers for giving me an advance copy to review through Netgalley.
This psychological thriller is different from the usual because it is told by the young girl who has been trying to find answers for her sister's disappearance for more than a decade. Through her research she concludes that Carl Feldman who was a published photographer, seems to be linked to girls who have disappeared.
She decides to take Carl on a road trip to the places he has photographed to try to get some answers. Carl is supposed to suffer from dementia, but as the story progresses, one wonders if that is just a front that Carl is putting on. Will she finally find the answers she is looking for, or will the road trip be a wild goose chase .
I have read other novels by this author and really enjoyed them, but unfortunately I could not get into this story. The characters seemed unbelievable and I got lost midway through the book as the storyline seemed to wander.

I enjoyed reading this fast-paced action packed mystery thriller that will keep you up at night. The characters are well planned out and developed with a setting that is perfect for a thrilling mystery.

Would you go on a road trip with a possible serial killer if it meant you would learn the truth about your sister's disappearance?

Carl Feldman was a photographer before dementia took away his autonomy. A young woman claiming to be his daughter takes him on a road trip to stir up memories, mainly to find our if he is a killer. There are so many things about that premise that make me want to scream at the characters, but it makes an intense book. Carl is quietly creepy, but you feel yourself starting to wonder if he is who he is made out to be. That unsettled feeling of not knowing what is around the corner kept me thinking about this book after it ended.

Incredibly unique take on the serial killer suspense genre. I've read a lot of thrillers, and this is definitely the first time I've seen one where the protagonists kidnaps the alleged killer hoping to get answers via a bizarre yet strategically engineered road trip.

Heroine Grace is very easy to like, especially for those of us who imagine we'd want to take matters into our own hands if we lost a loved one to a murderer, but the truly fascinating character here is Carl. Just creepy enough to remain suspicious, yet just human enough for the reader to doubt his guilt, Heaberlin kept me guessing until the end, and dosed a very dark plot with just enough humor and charm to make it fun.

Thank you to NetGalley for providing me with an ARC of this book in exchange for an honest review.

This is a very scary thriller that kept me turning the pages, but I thought some of the plot strands did not seem realistic.

Grace is literally chasing ghosts, i.e., trying to find out what happened to missing girls, presumed dead, like her beloved older sister Rachel. She believes Rachel was killed by an alleged serial killer, the famous photographer Carl Feldman. As the story begins, we find that Rachel is visiting Carl in the Texas home where he now resides, which serves as a halfway house for criminals with dementia. Rachel tells everyone, including Carl, that she is Carl’s daughter that he doesn’t remember. She asks to take him on a trip - her goal being to take Carl to the scene of where the girls went missing and to see if she can jar him into confessing.

The story is interesting, and there is certainly a lot of suspense, but I didn’t feel all the plot strands added up. Rachel reportedly “trained” extensively to be alert to any emergency, but she proves remarkably inept. Most jarringly, Carl was amazingly, and unrealistically, it seemed to me, strong, smart, and capable for an older man who supposedly has dementia - really was. Parts of the epilogue did not seem realistic at all. Finally, readers were left in the dark about many aspects of who Carl really was. It left me feeling a bit cheated.

While many of us wonder what we might do to the person who harmed one of our loved ones, this novel finds a young woman who spends her lifetime preparing to essentially kidnap the man she believes got away with murder. Or did he? Is he suffering from dementia? Or is he just extremely crafty? Does he know something about her sister's disappearance? Or is he really just a photographer? In the end, the truth is a little less than satisfying, but the roadtrip is worth every twist and turn.

Paper Ghosts was well written but there was no real plot twist that shocked me. I enjoyed the characters, even though the main character frustrated me at times, and I thought that the pace was good.
It was a story that I enjoyed reading but not one that I will remember from years to come,
Thank you to NetGalley for my ARC copy of this book in exchange for my honest review.

I have been caught in a thriller mood as of late and Julia Heaberlin delivered everything that I wanted. Paper Ghost reaches out and pulled me in from the minutes I started reading. I had a hard time putting it down to finish things in my busy schedule. My only complaint is that it did get a little slow in the middle, but I had no trouble getting through it. If you want a great psychological thriller then I highly recommend checking out Paper Ghost.

Paper Ghosts is a beautiful, twisted, intense read. Perfect for any reader who enjoys a plot twist! This book did not disappoint.

5 smoking hot stars for a thrill ride that kept me guessing the whole way. Wow. A road trip with your sister's murderer through the Texas landscape? Heck yes. This main character has some wrongs to right and the oomph to get it done. Wow. Just...amazing. I loved it.

Paper Ghosts has a great concept: a young girl tracks down her sister's killer but when she finds him. he is suffering from dementia. So she takes him on a trip to jog his memory of his crimes and find out where her sister is.
The execution is sub par. Also reviews compare it to the books of Gillian Flynn. While it has the same haunted and twisted protagonist, there isn't any really any suspense as I was easily able to figure out how they were going to play the ending (I kept waiting for the amazing twist to no avail). A sub story develops to add some tension but it is not a nail biter at all. But it does at least give some clarification to a plot devoid of real answers.
The best portions of the book are when carl talks about photography. I really enjoyed the descriptions and how he was moved by photography. The writer was able o put into words why photography can be such a great form of art.
Paper Ghosts is o.k. but it never really gives you the tension and puzzle you want. The whole novel skirts across the top of idea that could have been so much more deep

Paper Ghosts was amazingly written. It was haunting and beautiul and I couldn't put this down for a second.

Finally. A thriller that COMPLETELY surprised me at the end! I had so many guesses, but I wasn't even close. I read this book in just two sittings. I was on the edge of my seat the whole time and it was such a rollercoaster of emotions. I loved how the main character was basically a badass who was ready for absolutely anything this serial killer could think up to throw her off her game. This was definitely one of the best thrillers I've read in a long time.

I had a hard time getting into this book. I couldn't get into the main character, I just found her obsession so unrelatable. Since I did not finish the book, I do not intend to publish a review.

I would like to thank Random House Publishing Group - Ballantine and NetGalley for the opportunity to read this book.

I have not been reading thrillers lately because I was having an extremely difficult time finding ones that could give me that edge-of-your-seat feeling that I used to love to get from a good thriller. When I read this part of the description for Paper Ghosts though, I knew I had to take a chance:

"A gripping thriller about a man who may or may not have dementia—and who may or may not be a serial killer—from a master of twists and turns..." (Description from NetGalley)

There is nothing I like better from a thriller than a good guessing game. I love to be misled until the very end of the book, and that is exactly the experience I had with this book. Never at any point was I sure that I could trust my instincts regarding either Carl or the young woman who takes him on a road trip in search of answers.

Paper Ghosts was a pleasant surprise, and just what I needed to get me interested during a reading slump. This book is exciting and engaging, and I definitely recommend it to anyone who wants a shot of excitement in their reading life.

I was given a copy of this book in exchange for my honest review. All thoughts and opinions are my own and I am never compensated for my reviews.

Received an advanced copy from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review...

During my late teenage years and early twenties, I took on a job as a care giver at a facility which specifically handled Dementia and Alzheimer. After taking care of many people and guiding them on their end of life journey, I found the concept of this book rather interesting and intriguing. In all my time working with those beautiful old souls, I never knew who they were or used to be. And unfortunately, half the time, they never really knew either. When I read the synopsis this got my mind twirling with the possibilities.

This story follows Carl and our female protagonist, (who has no official name - until much later), on a road trip visiting sites where Carl may or may not have murdered some girls. Our protagonist is almost positive that Carl is the reason her sister disappeared. And this trip is supposed to jog his depleting memory into some sort of confession. However, it is a story and plans never goes as they should.

So we have two primary characters, where neither are very reliable or trustworthy. Our protagonist is obsessed with her sister's disappearance in a really unhealthy and borderline OCD manner. Which at times made me really question her actions and thinking process. She wants it to be Carl so entirely bad that it is hard to for a reader to truly trust her judgement or thought process. And then we have Carl, Carl is a little pistol. I truly enjoyed his character. He was an old, wise cracker with such a saucy side that had me cracking up at times. I almost forgot that he may or may not be a serial killer.

Mostly, I do not enjoy stories about road trips. In my opinion, they are predictable and over done. However, I didn't really get that feel with this story. The road trip had such a creepy and criminal intent to it that I really enjoyed. Overall, this story shed new light onto road trip stories for me. However, I feel like Heaberlin didn't quite nail Carl's disease. She presented many believable elements with Carl, but overall, I did not believe that she wrote the disease in a manner which was believable for how advanced his situation was supposed to be.

Overall, I found the story to be rather enjoyable. The banter between our characters, the murder theme, and the big mystery of did Carl kill Rachel or did he not?

I would suggest checking this story out.