What a very well written book this is and one that I highly recommend.

Gone is the first book I have read from this author and hope to read many more in the future.

The story starts off in the middle of summer with twins Kate and Ben going on vacation to the US. The twins disappear, a parent's worse nightmare. And, so the search begins.

Intriguing with well-crafted characters.

I can't say I've ever experienced the loss of a child, but the grief Sarah and Alec feel is palpable. Seeing the different ways in which they choose to cope was interesting. Everyone grieves differently, and it couldn't be more apparent than in these devastated parents. The story is very emotional, but at times seemed to wander a bit far off course. I was a bit disappointed with how it ends (I won't spoil it), so I'm leaving my rating at a 3.

A difficult read as you see people grow apart instead of closer after experiencing their childrens disappearance. I could not relate to the characters and found it hard to be involved with the story as they didn't seem to 'come to life'. Written more like a memoir of both parents. You never hear from the twins voices as to what actually happened. If you want to read what not to do in a crisis in a marriage then this would definitely fit the bill.
I received this book as a complimentary copy for an unbiased review.The opinions expressed are my own.

I received an ARC of this book from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

I felt like something was just... missing here. like maybe there wasn't enough emotion in what was written?

Overall, it was good, but not great.

I am unsure as to a rating for this book. It had a good narrative style and was easy to read but I wanted more.

A couple's 18 year old twins go on a trip to New york with a set of American twins who they have only just met. Apart from one phone call to say they have landed and a couple of strange written communications neither set of twins are heard of Again.

The search for them as portrayed in the book seems rather half-hearted - its like the author left out the passion and the drive to find out more. I think it is there but too understated. The drifting apart of Alec and Sarah also seems to happen without any impetus but perhaps there is a certain reality to that.

At times the books seems to drift along and themes are introduced, such as the poverty in Mali, that really have no bearing on the focus of the novel. The ending for the reader is so deeply disappointing that I nearly threw my kindle across the room. Is the author planning a second book?

For me there wasn't enough depth in the book it was almost a gloss over of what should have been real emotion.

In the end I have gone for a 2 star rating - if the ending had been better it might have been 3.

Sarah is married to Alec who is more than twenty years older than her. It is 1999. Their 18 year old twins are due to start University after the summer i and they are a happy family. However, a pair of American teens show up at their door, also a boy girl set of twins and born on the same date as the English twins, They claim they have been sent by the Friendship agency an exchange scheme the family has hosted in the past but not this year. Being very liberal they welcome the twins and there is a message from a Mrs Murdstone (Oliver twist reference?) on their voicemail explaining the mix up. The twins all become inseparable and want to go back to the US to travel for a bit, so Alec and Sarah wave them off and then never see them again. The student exchange agency know nothing about the US twins and the story follows how Sarah copes in the aftermath of their loss by painting, gaining recognition and eventually becoming ready to move on in her life. She accepts that the children are dead, convinced they have been recruited by a millennial cult who want live twin sacrifices. Alec however has hope the twins are alive and moves to the US to search for them and acquires a down and out look a like surrogate son..

I found this book a little bit hard going at first. I was unsure if I cared enough about the characters to continue and the writing style kept switching. However. I did find myself becoming engrossed as the narrative went down slightly unexpected pathways and then... well it just stops. I felt quite frustrated not to know what the outcome for Alec and Sarah was. It felt like apiece of work that was still a work in progress.

The biggest problem I had with this Book was it there was no resolution, as to what had happened to the missing children. I did enjoy the different love stories evolving. That being said I was left somewhere disappointment. I gave it three stars. A bit of a struggle to read. Very wordy

GONE by Jeannie van Rompaey is a very unique book, one of its kind. The books is initially established in UK where a small family of four lives happily. Sarah and Alec raise their twins Kate and Ben in a very healthy environment. When another pair of twins visit them from USA to live with them for the holidays, the entire story turns into a nightmare for Sarah and Alec. Kate and Ben develop a strong bond with the American twins and eventually they leave to US on a so-called holiday but never come back.

Alec leaves to US in search of the twins and discovers a variety of truths about religious groups, cults and other strange groups. Sarah, on the other hand, realizes that she is never going to see the twins again in her life, drowns herself in art, painting and eventually gets herself busy in exhibitions. Alec finds a homeless young man of Ben's age in US and brings him home and fosters him. Alec's presence in UK with Sarah gradually decreases and he starts spending more time in US since Alec finds relief in taking care of the youngman.

Sarah falls in love with a widower Oumar. Sarah finds peace in bonding with Oumar's fourteen-year-old daughter. Sarah decides to ask for a divorce from Alec but finds a conflict in her heart when she learns about Alec's little secret, his foster son.

The story is very gripping with a lot of pain, grief, hope and love. If you ever loved someone and lost them, you must read this book. I liked how the author shown the characters of the story dealing with grief in different ways. Very engaging book and beautifully written.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for this Kindle ARC of GONE. I was very intrigued by the description and premise of this book and for the first 3/4 of the story, it was very intriguing. Sarah and Alec and their 17 year old twins, Kate and Ben, live in England. The twins are preparing for their first year at college. During the summer, they meet a set of twins the same age in a very unusual way and travel with them to the United States, not to be seen or heard from again. Sarah and Alec are understandably panicked and besides reaching out to authorities in both England and the U.S., Alec decides to travel to the U.S. to follow any leads. Sarah and Alec's biggest fear is that the twins have been abducted into a cult. The writing is crisp and urgent. There are very few leads and Sarah and Alec's marriage suffers, as Alec decides to stay in the U.S. long term to continue his search. The book veers off track toward the end with Alec and Sarah's separate lives, as it seems their marriage can't survive the loss and the reality that they may never see their children again. For the most part, GONE is a suspenseful and sad -a study in the loss of children to the unknown and the loss of an entire family.

I gave this book a 5 out of 5 star review. It was an enjoyable and I would recommend. to others. Generously provided to me through NetGalley

Written from the perspective of two parents who's twin children leave home one day and never return.

Sarah is very relatable as a character and I felt her pain as she was wishing she had done things differently in the days leading up to the dissapearance. Sarah and Alec each deal with the loss of thier children very differently. One preferring to continue believing that the children are still alive and the other needing to accept that they have died and grieve for them.

I enjoyed this book very much although I didn't expect it to finish where it did. I would have liked a little more of a conclusion.

I would like to thank Netgalley and the publishers for an advanced copy of this book in return for an honest review.

This is a fantastic read full of uncertainty and towards the end, the possibility of second chances although it's not clear just what Sarah will decide. This book is going to stay with me for a long long time. I would definitely recommend reading it and I would like to thank the publishers and netgalley for letting me have the book to review and the opinions expressed are entirely my own views.

A well written book.
Such a sad story its really heartbreaking.
Strong p,it, characters well written
Recommended read
Thank you to both NetGalley and BooksGoSocial for my eARC in exchange for my honest unbiased review

This was the first book I received on NetGalley, and while it wasn't necessarily the genre of material I normally read, I started it and realized that I couldn't put it down.

It was very intriguing, however every once in a while the characters became hard to follow, but I was able to get right back on track, and truly appreciated the atmosphere of the book and how the story played out.

Seventeen-year-old twins, Kate and Ben, leave unexpectedly for America with mysterious Danielle and Jay. But when they don't return and stop contacting their parents, Sarah and Alec know something's not right. Each parent pursues their children on their own terms, leaving their relationship to suffer. Alec searches for his children in America and investigates fundamentalist cults while Sarah rediscovers her passion for painting and a new love.
In the end, Sarah and Alec must come to terms with the future of their relationship. And that's where I'm stuck. The ending is unresolved, and that's both exciting and disturbing. Before I reached the end of the book, I would have given it a 2-star rating because it progresses fairly slowly and contains a significant amount of cursing. However, the ending pushed the book to 3-stars for me. It's suspenseful and questioning and exciting. Wow!

This book is about every parents worst nightmare. I couldn’t imagine never having closure on an experience like this. Having started this book I was immediately drawn into the characters of Alec and Sarah and loved them both. As the book progressed I was more and more invested in the story and eager to get to a resolution, whatever it was. At the words The End I was sorely disappointed. There was no resolution. It was almost as though a few chapters were missing. I’m not sure whether a sequel is planned for this book but there was definitely no closure for Sarah, Alec or the invested reader.

This book kept me reading because I wanted to find out what happened. But it was rather unsatisfying because the reader never finds out. It ends as though someone just put a period at the end and called it good. I was disappointed about this because the plot was not given a proper ending.

Gone is so well written I felt like I was reading someone's memoir rather than a novel. Every parents nightmare is a child going missing but for your twins to both disappear is hell. I highly recommend this book.

In the hot summer before the millennium, seventeen-year-old twins, Kate and Ben, go on vacation from England to the United States with charismatic American twins of the same age. They fail to return. Their devastated parents, Sarah and Alec, try to discover where their children are and why they haven't been in touch.

Sarah finds some solace in painting and falls in love with a widower, Oumar, who has a fourteen-year-old daughter. Sarah bonds with her and feels she is being offered a second chance at parenting. She intends to ask Alec for a divorce so that she and Oumar can marry. But Alec has a secret of his own that forces Sarah to reconsider her options.

This is definitely a diamond in the rough type of book! The way the author tells this story is so vivid and detailed that you feel as if you are apart of the mystery yourself. I couldn't race through this book fast enough, I so desperately wanted to figure out what happened to these twins that I couldn't stop reading until I finished it.

Thanks to #NetGalley for the ARC of #Gone
Pub Date: 19 Oct 2018