Did Shaun's uncle die in a car accident 20 years ago? Or is he living in New York? Or was he killed in Minnesota? Startled to find out that his uncle may not have died when and how his family told him, Shaun begins to try and hunt his uncle down. Along the way, he comes into contact with a website that focuses on identifying John Does. Chapter titles are based on the point of view at that point in time. This is a bit confusing at the beginning as the titles use the screen names for everyone instead of their real names. But, the reader quickly gets used to it and each character has enough of a unique personality to provide reminders. The backstories of the people on the site, their interactions, and Shaun's hunt combine for a terrific story that holds the reader's attention. The characters are interesting and the anxiety increases as the reader realizes they are running out of pages without a resolution. I could have done with an extra chapter at about 97% (right after a chapter from Rainbowbrite) to add tension and maybe explain a couple things, but otherwise the writing was excellent. There were also a few times where Ms. Lotz imposed British grammar onto an American character. These did not deter from a solid read.

Goodness me! This novel fairly drips with suspense and tension. Part of that comes about because the author used a plotting element I usually don't like at all - we know who committed the crimes almost from the start of the story. In this case there is a depth of character building that made me accept that person and learn who they are and care in spite of myself.

A website is devoted to helping match up missing people with the remains of unidentified bodies. This is not an official website, but one that has had some small success with solving old missing person cases. The story is told through texts, webcam conversations and emails as well as standard narrative to keep the story from bogging down. Those short conversations help convey what the members of the online group are doing and shows what progress, or lack of progress, they have made without having to go into so much detail that it would slow the story down too much. A man in Ireland is using the internet to search for information about his brother, very much against the wishes of his family members. A member of this web search group sees his request for information on a different site and the decision is made to try to help Shaun find out what has happened to Teddy. What follows is a compelling story that emphasizes how easy it is to lose perspective concerning who you are really talking to on the internet.

Missing Person is a strong psychological thriller that allowed me to connect with the characters and even made the killer multi-dimensional. The ending was a little too pat for me, but otherwise I enjoyed this one quite a lot and simply barreled through it. I'm definitely going to have to check out other books by Sarah Lotz.

Thank you to NetGalley and Mulholland Books, an imprint of Little, Brown and Company for an e-galley of this novel.

I received an advanced copy of this book in exchange for an honest review. Thank you to Mulholland Books and Netgalley!

MISSING PERSON by Sarah Lotz begins with Shaun Ryan, an introvert Irish bookseller. Shaun has always believed that his uncle Teddy died in a car accident before he was born, but he's recently discovered that this wasn't true. Teddy was gay and fled from his conservative family and county to move to New York. Shaun sets out to find him, but has no luck. His dysfunctional family urges Shaun to stop looking, but Shaun doesn't understand why.

Chris Guzman is the woman who runs a website dedicated to matching missing persons cases with unidentified bodies. With a group of dedicated members, they use crowd sourcing and computer technologies to help find information missed in formal investigations. Her team has seen Teddy's picture and thinks they've found a match. They believe that Teddy is the young man whose body was found years before, the case known as the "Boy in the Dress". With the assistance of the website members, they begin to investigate to determine how Teddy wound up dead in Wisconsin wearing a dress.

The concept of crowd sourcing investigations fascinates me and it is what initially drew me to this book. I haven't read any of Sarah Lotz's books before (though I do have one sitting on my shelves waiting for me to pick it up). The book is written in chapters that alternate POV between Shaun, Chris and a couple other key website members, each chapter labeled with the screenname of the character. Text messages and snapchat conversations are interspersed with the narrative as well.

This is in some ways a difficult book to characterize. The best match for me would be mystery. Though you know some aspects going in, the story revolves around explaining the whys. Why exactly did Teddy leave town, why exactly did he wind up in Wisconsin, why exactly was he found wearing a dress. For me this didn't have the fast-pace that I would expect to label it a thriller, but there was enough suspense built up to keep me hooked on the story.

It was interesting looking at this book as a character study of online personalities, especially since we all meet people in our bookish life that we only know online. The book draws attention to online bullying and the dangers of crowd sourcing. When the group feels that someone is to blame, there can be a lot of backlash and the target feels the pressure, deserved or not. The members of the forum also can't all be trusted. Are these people all there to help or might some be there to hinder.
If you are looking for a good mystery with a very interesting premise, this is a book you'll want to check out when it is released on September 3, 2019!

This review will be posted as follows (links to be provided once posts go live):

Blog - dgreads.home.blog on 8/28/2019 with a link posted simultaneously to Twitter (@dg90247)

Goodreads - this review will be posted on 8/28/2019

Instagram - an abbreviated version will also be posted to Instagram on 8/28/2019 with a publication day reminder shared in stories on 9/3/2019

Amazon & Barnes&Noble reviews will be posted upon publication.

Thank you Netgalley for the opportunity to preview Missing Person by Sarah Lotz. I have not read any of this author's books in the past but have heard they are good. I did not find this book a mystery or a thriller.
A young man, Shaun, in Ireland wants to solve the mystery of a missing uncle who left Ireland for over twenty years and was not heard from again. Shaun would like to find out what happened - he is hoping that maybe his uncle is alive and well. So Shaun starts to use social media to determine what may have happened to his uncle. and the sleuthing begins.
There is alot of internet and webchat that goes on, and although it has to do with the plot, it got old for me. I think this is a good book, however, for me it was not a thriller and was categorized wrong. More along the lines of general fiction.
3 stars.

I loved this unputdownable book!
It was a thrilling, unnerving read. The characters were realistic. The plot was gripping and fast-paced. Run, do not walk, out to get this fab book.
Thank you NetGalley.

I STARTED THIS BOOK MANY MONTHS AGO AND JUST NOW PICKED IT UP AGAIN.
IT WAS PRETTY GOOD, BUT DID NOT HOLD MY ATTENTION.
I MIGHT TRY IT AGAIN AT A DIFFERENT TIME.

Years ago I read Skeleton Crew, non-fiction title about websleuths who try to match up missing persons with unidentified dead bodies, and while I really liked it and found the topic fascinating, what I was most interested in was the websleuths themselves - who they were, why they were doing it, and how they got into it. Basically, while I liked Skeleton Crew, it left me wanting more (don't you hate that).

Missing Person delivered on everything that I was craving from Skeleton Crew. I couldn't put this book down and read it in two sittings.

The book opens with Shaun, a young man in Ireland, learns that his uncle Teddy, who he had previously been told died in a car accident 30 years ago, actually ran away to New York. Shaun sets out to locate his missing uncle, which puts him into contact with members of a forum dedicated to identifying dead John/Jane Does. Members quickly suspect Teddy is the "Boy in a Dress", a case they previously investigated and that remains unsolved.

You know very early on who the killer is, so if you're looking for a straight mystery/suspense novel this probably isn't the right match. What I really liked was the well drawn characters that make up the story, and that's ultimately what I found so compelling about the book. The author does a great job of bringing these characters and their motivations to life.

With the fairly recent explosion in the amount of information online, police aren’t the only ones investigating crimes. It is now possible to track killers, identify bodies, and to use familial DNA to catch rapists and serial killers without any specialized training and right from the comfort of home. There are blogs, forums and social media accounts dedicated purely to cold cases that law enforcement seems to have given up on. I can only imagine the relief to know what happened to your loved one, even if their story ends with Jane or John Doe. To be honest, my true crime loving heart is never happier than when a group of regular people take down a dangerous criminal.

There are several obvious pitfalls with this and lives can be ruined if the finger is erroneously pointed at an innocent person. It could put their life in danger as vigilantes decide to “deal with” the killers/molester/ rapist and keep them from committing another crime. The true crime forum in Missing Person has faced this problem in the past with tragic consequences and now is dedicated solely to identifying unidentified bodies. This sounds fairly benign and safe for everyone but the case of The Boy in the Dress leads to all kinds of trouble, including contact with a serial killer. Fairly early on we meet the killer who has joined the forum as a way of keeping tabs on their investigation and misdirecting whenever possible. He gets a thrill from being so close to people actively looking for the killer in a murder that he knows he committed. With the anonymity of user names you never really know who you are talking to online and this can be used for evil. The online group in Missing Person are just normal people who find they are unknowingly battling wits with a serial killer.

This book checked all my boxes for a great story; I love true crime, cat and mouse games led by a serial killer, and regular people as crime fighters. Much of the text is taken directly from the forum which makes it like reading an actual forum. In my opinion this would be completely awful as an audiobook but written it comes off as authentic and makes it all feel more real. These same conversations could be happening hundreds of times in real life in various forums and that brings the action right home. As someone who on occasion reads true crime forums the dialogue felt typical and true to life. When things went truly wrong it becomes a good cautionary tale but it also demonstrated how effective “armchair detectives” can be. The story drew me right in and even before the action moved from the forum and into the lives of the members it is super exciting. The online content was interspersed with short sections that peek into the lives of the forum members, including the killer. I found it all fascinating.

I think this book will especially appeal to true crime junkies, but it will be exciting and engaging for anyone who likes a good thriller. I wouldn’t say it is a happy story but there is some humour to lighten the mood. The characters are interesting and seem like real people and the plot is basically ripped from the headlines. This story is so effective because it feels real and could essentially be real. I very much enjoyed this one and I highly recommend it to Murderinos everywhere.

Thank you to Mulholland Books for providing an Electronic Advance Reader Copy via NetGalley for review.

ARC FROM NET GALLEY

A decent story but without the fright her fans have come to expect. I learned a lot about the world of web sleuthing but I missed the mystery.

By far my favourite book of Sarah Lotz’s is The White Road. Insanely atmospheric and creepy, it’s an examination of the thrill of discovery, the ghosts that walk beside us, and the quest for more – more thrills, more danger, more fame. When I read the blurb for Missing Person (which has changed significantly – obviously lots of edits were done, and the release date pushed back numerous times by my count), I expected to love it as much (if not more) than Lotz's previous novels.

Not so, unfortunately. While this is a solid book, it didn’t feel particularly like a Sarah Lotz novel, nor did I quite get the point? By the end, nothing had happened. The stakes didn’t feel high. It wasn’t thrilling. It wasn’t scary. It’s a nice dive into the world of web sleuthing, with a diverse cast of characters, and even a peek into the mind of a killer, but again – I didn’t find it at all frightening.

It begins with a young Irishman named Shaun Ryan, discovering that his uncle – believed long dead – actually left Ireland for New York City decades before. (A note that in the original blurb - still posted on GoodReads, it was Shaun's *brother* who was missing - I think this would have been much more effective, so I'm surprised it was changed). Stuck in a small village with a dead-end job and a family he dislikes, Shaun is intrigued by the idea that his uncle could still be alive. Utilizing the Internet, he posts Teddy’s photo on forums, seeking answers as to his whereabouts. A group of web sleuths recognize the photo – they believe it resembles a composite done for the victim of a brutal murder – a victim known as “the boy in the dress”.

What follows is a lot of back-and-forth, interspersed with web chats, WhatsApp messages, forum postings, and very little action. Shaun and the web sleuths from “Missing Linc” attempt to piece together Teddy’s last movements, and track down vanished evidence from the botched police investigation. The drama between the “sleuths” isn’t particularly compelling, but I did find them to be a likable bunch, all with their own reasons for caring so much about the boy in the dress and/or cold cases in general.

Generally, the novel is well-written and I really did like the subject matter. But I should have felt that the stakes were high. I should have felt terrified for the sleuths with a killer in their midst. I should have been shocked and laid bare by the ending. Instead, I had to wonder what it was all for?

Again, Sarah Lotz has terrified me in the past. There are passages in The White Road that had me putting down my Kindle, too anxious to continue. It isn’t that Missing Person is a bad book. It’s that it’s marketed as a thriller, and it’s not even remotely in that category.

For the record, my favourite character was Daphne the dog.

Thank you to NetGalley for the ARC in exchange for an honest review. I appreciate it!

Why would Shaun Ryan’s family lie about the death of his uncle Teddy? For years the bookseller has believed what his family told him, that Teddy had been killed in a car accident. But the truth is that Teddy left Ireland for New York twenty years ago. So why the big cover-up? Teddy has not been seen or heard from since he left Ireland, and Shaun keeps hitting dead ends in his search for the man. Then he is contacted by Chris Guzzman a woman who has dedicated her life to solving missing persons cases, matching bodies to missing people. She believes that Teddy was murdered by a serial that targeted gay men. While Shaun is eager to discover what happened to his uncle, he can’t help being skeptical. How did this group of amateurs solve a case the police couldn’t? With the killer still at large, there is a lot riding on Shaun’s investigation, maybe even his life. High voltage thrills from a woman who has become a master in the genre