I really enjoyed reading The Disappearance of Stephanie Mailer by Joël Dicker. It's a gripping mystery that keeps you guessing until the end. The characters are well-developed and the plot is full of twists and turns. The writing style is engaging and easy to follow. I would recommend this book to anyone who likes a good thriller with a touch of humour.

A great book that is well written
I liked the story.
The pacing was good.
A page turner. An don’t you freeze the pack that’s what I was thinking we should’ve had. This is what we should’ve had Jesus

I really struggled with this book after about 50% its just never seemed to go anywhere unfortunately this book just wasnt for me

Due to a sudden, unexpected passing in the family a few years ago and another more recently and my subsequent (mental) health issues stemming from that, I was unable to download this book in time to review it before it was archived as I did not visit this site for several years after the bereavements. This meant I didn't read or venture onto netgalley for years as not only did it remind me of that person as they shared my passion for reading, but I also struggled to maintain interest in anything due to overwhelming depression. I was therefore unable to download this title in time and so I couldn't give a review as it wasn't successfully acquired before it was archived. The second issue that has happened with some of my other books is that I had them downloaded to one particular device and said device is now defunct, so I have no access to those books anymore, sadly.

This means I can't leave an accurate reflection of my feelings towards the book as I am unable to read it now and so I am leaving a message of explanation instead. I am now back to reading and reviewing full time as once considerable time had passed I have found that books have been helping me significantly in terms of my mindset and mental health - this was after having no interest in anything for quite a number of years after the passings. Anything requested and approved will be read and a review written and posted to Amazon (where I am a Hall of Famer & Top Reviewer), Goodreads (where I have several thousand friends and the same amount who follow my reviews) and Waterstones (or Barnes & Noble if the publisher is American based). Thank you for the opportunity and apologies for the inconvenience.

Fabulous slow burn of a book that carefully reveals its secrets drop by drop. It can seem a little clunky in places which is most likely down to the translation, so stick with it because every time you put it down, you will find it calling you back for just one chapter more

If you want suspense, guesswork and wonder what’s around the corner then this is the book for you, full of the unknown.
Thanks to both publishers and NetGalley for gifting me this great book,

This book draws the reader in and keeps them guessing with its deep and thought-provoking characters and themes. Through their dialogue and development, we learn more about the lives of Stephanie and her husband Antoine, as well as the other supporting characters who become involved in the case.

Joel Dicker is an incredibly talented writer, managing to keep the readers on their toes with unpredictable twists and turns throughout the story. Not to mention, he writes with a poetic prose that provides us with detailed, almost cinematic descriptions of characters, scenes, and emotions.

If you're a fan of detective novels and suspenseful mysteries, The Disappearance of Stephanie Mailer is an unmissable read. It is a compelling exploration of loyalty, ambition, and what lies beneath the surface. An extraordinary book by a master storyteller.

I have been meaning to read another Joël Dicker novel ever since I spent a wonderful afternoon reading The Truth About the Harry Quebert Affair while eating a slice of the best cake I have ever tasted in my life. I have an incredibly strong sensory association between the plot of that novel and the incredible frosting on said dessert but all these years later, the pace of my life has shifted and so I read The Disappearance of Stephanie Mailer more in snatched fragments. The pace of investigating back across the decades with interweaving narratives was very similar to the Harry Quebert but otherwise the novel had quite a different feel. Written with flair and with a fascinating final reveal, this nevertheless felt like a plot which ... wandered.

The premise goes as follows; in 1994 the theatre festival is about to open in Orphea, a small seaside town. On the opening night however, the mayor and his family are found shot dead along with a young jogger who was shot outside, a presumed witness to the crime. Jesse Roseberg and Derek Scott work hard and solve the case but the process takes its toll. Derek Scott chooses to take an administration role directly afterwards. Twenty years later, Jesse Rosenberg is ready to take early retirement from the police force when he is approached by young journalist Stephanie Mailer who tells him that he made a mistake all those years ago and that the killer walked free. Jesse tries to tell himself that this is not possible, their investigation was too thorough. But as his doubts begin to grow, Stephanie Mailer herself goes missing. What did she know? And what exactly did they miss back in 1994?

There was a lot of great things about this novel. The twists and turns of the plot were entertaining and there were several interesting characters. I feel it rather suffered though because I read it more or less in tandem with Jane Harper's Exiles and I got in the habit of thinking of the two as my plausible thriller and ... the other one. When I told my partner that the plot had got to the point where the man who apparently knew the identity of the killer was only intending to agree it through the medium of his previously unstaged play, Boy who Reads not a Lot asked, 'And have they not just tried waterboarding him to get the answer' and this did seem like the more likely event. Another character is let off possible jail time if she agrees to act in said play. It became ... difficult to sustain one's disbelief. Even more so that Scott and Rosenberg seriously believed that they had carried out an airtight investigation with so many loose threads left swinging in the breeze.

Another problem was Dicker's rather lacklustre dialogue. This became particularly obvious during the conversations between the Eden family. It was all incredibly robotic and I found myself murmuring, 'Nobody talks like this'. Every time Meta Ostrovski came on the page were more howlers - Dicker has actually created a critic character called Meta. The ultimate 'romance' between two of the leads felt completely awkward and unnatural given that there had been no flirtatious interactions in the run-up and it also resolved none of the issues which each character was struggling with. And while I quite enjoyed the descriptions of Jesse's grandparents, I was left slightly bug-eyed by their Jesse/Jessica debacle. I am genuinely amazed that that episode made it past an editor.

Having said all of that, I read the book reasonably quickly and it held my interest. The denouement was genuinely clever even if the route to get there left quite a bit to be desired. It feels rather as if Dicker is trying to write a modern Christie novel with all of the overblown incidences commonly found in her oeuvre in a contemporary setting. Still, I did not find Stephanie Mailer as compelling a story as Harry Quebert so I think I will have to read another Dicker novel for a best of three judgement. Perhaps I can even try to track down some of that cake to read alongside to make for a fair test ...

This was interesting and intriguing with a good pace and plenty of developments to hold my attention.

I loved ‘The Truth about the Harry Quebert Affair’ so couldn’t wait to read this one! The plot is cleverly thought out and really keeps you guessing. I couldn’t put it down!
20 Years after a quadruple murder that Jesse Rosenberg solved with his partner Derek Scott, a journalist approaches him telling him that he made a mistake and the real murderer is still out there, before she can give any more details, Stephanie disappears. This leaves Jesse and Derek faced with the possibility that her suspicions may have been warranted.
This is a twisty tale that will keep you guessing. Lots of characters are introduced and woven into the story which add to the over all suspense. I loved how well all the characters were written, and how drawn into their lives I became.
5 stars without a doubt. I would read this all over again!

This was an enjoyable book, but not terribly gripping. An Interesting storyline which ran along smoothly. 4 stars from me.

This was missing something for me and I really struggled to finish this, it really didn't need to be this long. It wasn't really gripping and I felt there was at times no real idea how information was intended to be found out.

Fabulous thriller that kept me eagerly turning the pages!! Fantastic characters and plot, could not put it down.

The Disappearance of Stephanie Mailer was a really great solid read 4🌟 but I felt disappointed it didn't hit the heady heights of the Truth About the Harry Quebert Affair.

This review was a tricky one to write. I’m not sure what it was about this book that didn’t wow me as it bad all the elements of a fantastic book. It might have been because I loved ‘The Truth About The Harry Quebert Affair’ SO MUCH, or that I read this one in more of a hurry on my kindle and didn’t give it as much attention as it deserved. I’m not sure.

I didn’t love it, I didn’t hate it. I felt a little let down by it but it probably is still a 3 star rating out of 5. Which when 2.5 is average, is not bad at all!

I felt it dipped a lot in the middle and the conclusion wasn’t as satisfying as I’d have hoped for, especially with a book of its size! It didn’t have me gripped the whole way through, page turning to know what happened… ​

I did however really love all the characters and felt like I ‘got’ them. I was invested in their individual storylines, albeit some elements I felt were slightly drawn out. ​

I don’t want to ay much and ruin the story for anyone who hasn’t read this one and by all means don’t want to stop anyone from picking this book up, it might be in your top 10 books of 2021!

What a amazing read.

This was a very good read.

Thoroughly enjoyed from start to finish and could not get enough of.

This is a must read for anyone who enjoys a good book!!
Absolutely loved the characters, the plot, the tension -  impossible to put it down.
Certainly recommended!

I really don’t know why it took me so long to read this, because I loved it!!

This is another brilliant read my Joel Dicker. Having read Harry Quebert I had high hopes and this did not disappoint. Told in the same staccato sentence structure and with dual timelines I enjoyed reading the two stories as they unfolded.

With plenty of intriguing characters, twisty clues and the drip feed of information I could not put it down.

When Stephanie Mailer, a small town journalists, disappears it seems she was about to break an old murder case wide open. Was the murderer really apprehended or is there a murkier force at work. Read it and find out!!!!

I have, I am disappointed to say given up on their book, I can’t remember the last time I did this but it felt never ending! I loved the previous books but this was such a disappointment

Harry Quebert is one of my top 10 books of the C21st and so I was thrilled when I saw that Joël Dicker had a new book out (I also read The Baltimore Boys which I really liked too).
I really love Joël's style of writting, he draws you in from the very first sentence; I like how he structures the book around different characters and timelines. He doesn't write short novels and so when you are investing so much time in to each one, it has to be worthwhile - which again, this is.
I particularly enjoyed reading the 'evidence' narrated by each of the storytellers and their points of view. they certainly kept you guessing.
Was slightly underwhelmed with the conclusion as I expecting something epic, however, the writing makes up for this.
Will definitely be looking for his next book.

Dicker has done it again! Master of crime fiction with a gripping plot and an atmosphere than enthrals you. Every one of his novels I've loved