This is a solid debut from a new author. I think the author was on the right track here but it just didn't play out as well as I'd have hoped. It's a unique storyline in that an abused wife acts as a couple's daughter who disappeared 20 years ago. However, there are way too many coincidences in here. You find out right away who she is, so this isn't a spoiler. But, Elizabeth grew up in the same town as the Barkley's and was there on the day Charlotte disappeared. Everything else aligned up so perfectly that it was so unbelievable.

I think the most interesting part of the story was Elizabeth and her son, Theo, who had escaped from an abusive marriage. They really had never left their home. It was thrilling as she was looking behind her back all the time. But, this got resolved way too quickly too.

Didn't completely work for me but considering this is a debut, I will try to read the author's next book.

The premise of this book is very intriguing. Your daughter goes missing then suddenly appears out of nowhere 20 years later. Is she really your daughter or is she an imposter playing a game? The first half had me hooked. The pacing was perfect and pulled me in. The second half slowed down the pace and many situations were slightly over the top. All in all I enjoyed the reading experience. I wished the entire book would have been as entertaining as the first 50%.
Thank you NetGalley and Crooked Lane Books for my ARC.

The long-missing-child-returns-as-an-adult plotline is always fun for a thriller and I enjoyed it here! I had a ton of theories about who Elizabeth really was, none of which turned out to be quite right, so I was surprised by the reveal. But I found the big climax a bit overdramatic and ridiculous and it felt rushed through. So I did like reading this book overall, but found the end disappointing.

This one did not work for me. The story itself was fine and twisty - even creepy at times, but I found the writing style to be jarring and disjointed. I had to work very hard to follow, and I'd find myself reading and re-reading to understand how I got to where I was...and anyone who knows me knows I don't like to work that hard when I'm reading.

A truly thrilling experience with so many twists and turns you'll be flabbergasted when its over!

Myra and Herb run an Inn in a small town and tragedy struck them many years ago when their daughter Charlotte was kidnapped from the beach. Many years later Elizabeth finds herself in this Inn and is being mistaken for the missing girl and even wears the same necklace as Charlotte. SO many family secrets, who is telling the truth?

A young woman shows up at bed and breakfast while on the run from leaving an abusive relationship and she ends up at a place where a family has been longing for their daughter to return for twenty years. Could this young woman be the missing girl and could this family help her escape the life she was living?

I love a twisting and turning story where there are many layers and many ups and downs almost until the very end. Told through a few of the women's points of view, the book switches between and I loved this part of the story. Seeing the action unfold from different perspectives helps the reader see how each character reacts to the information as it comes out.

This book was one of those where the synopsis was great and I was absolutely intrigued, but I am not sure that it fully lived up to the promise of the synopsis. There were a few times where I may have rolled my eyes at the convenience of things coming together or was confused by how the pieces fit. It felt as though the plot just didn't completely fit together from point A to point B.

After finishing the book, I realized this was a debut and for me that was interesting to find out and it made me want to see what comes next from this author.

I absolutely LOVED this book my Melissa Colasanti. It is definitely not a suspense type thriller. More along the lines of a mystery. But the book was well thought out and executed great, I couldn't put this book down!

This book is about two premises that come to meet as one. Myra Barkley's daughter Charlotte has been missing since childhood, twenty years ago. She vanished one day along the beach in her home town. For twenty years, No one has any answers for Myra.

Elizabeth Lark has secrets. More than one. Her change in identity, a potential murder... Just to escape the "prison" her so called boyfriend has her in.

When Elizabeth Lark shows up with her son at Myra's bed and breakfast. Everything changes for Myra. Myra soon thinks that Elizabeth is her missing Charlotte of twenty years. Will Myra prove to be right? Or will Elizabeth simply be a woman on the run?

Thank you so much to NetGalley and Crooked Lane Books for the advance reading copy.

One thing I really liked about this book was the premise. I love reading about people going missing or people returning. Also, people running from the past is always a favorite of mine as well, I will be honest and say I did want more from this book and I felt like some things in the book were a little too cliché and I felt like I knew how the Outcome was going to be throughout the whole story. Although this one was not a winner for me I will be checking out more by this author in the future.

Call Me Elizabeth Lark was so good! An intimate take on family as they navigate through a crisis in so many ways. The mystery and suspense were tense and page turning. Well done!

Eight-year-old Charlotte vanishes whilst being looked after by her older sister, Gwen. Twenty years later, their mother, Myrna thinks Charlotte has returned when Elizabeth Lark walks into her B&B, the Barkley Inn. Elizabeth is fleeing from her abusive husband and has her son with her.

Melissa Colasanti has woven such a compelling, tangled web of a tale! Her début novel, Call Me Elizabeth Lark is full of twists, misdirection, secrets and lies as the reader hears from three protagonists, Myrna, Gwen and Elizabeth. The plot was fascinating though I didn't particularly take to any of the characters. I appreciated the author's great, haunting scene-setting and I didn't foresee the ending. A very worthwhile read.

I received a complimentary copy of this novel at my request from Crooked Lane Books via NetGalley. This review is my own unbiased opinion.

This was a twisted, suspenseful tale that kept me turning pages. I had to see what happened next. The plot was cleverly crafted and drew me in from the beginning.
Many thanks to Crooked Lane Books and to NetGalley for providing me with a galley in exchange for my honest opinion.

I really struggled with this book. I contemplated marking it a DNF but I held out hope that it would turn around and redeem it's self; unfortunately it didn't. The writing felt disjointed, some paragraphs toggled between past and present within the span of sentences making it difficult to follow. I would have to go back and re-read a few different times to figure out the jump. The alternating character POV's for chapters also got confusing for me, sometimes it felt that other characters would start narrating mid chapter. The reasoning behind what happened to Charlotte and why, who Elizabeth Lark really was and why she lived the adult life she did felt unbelievable and far fetched. This writing style and storyline was not for me. I never got sucked in, never felt tied to any character and the plot felt disjointed. I would have a hard time recommending this book to friends.

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Thank you for the opportunity to review this book! I was so excited to get the approval. I love the cover; it's gorgeous! I think there is a lot to be gained from reading this book. It's uniqueness is in its coverage of the traumatic experiences felt by these women. The writing style is pretty good. I liked the twists, although some were a bit convoluted or hard to believe.

I really enjoyed this book. It was different from books I've read before and it kept me engaged throughout. It wasn't an edge of your seat thriller but it was a good mystery. 

It's a story of a family who had a daughter/sister who went missing when she was eight years old. And now 20 years later someone shows up claiming to be her. But not everyone believes that it is her because they have had so many false hopes before.

It is a good family drama in that everyone has secrets that are coming out. And I was hooked wanting to find out more.

Thank you to Netgalley and Crooked Lane Books for this eARC.

I received an ARC copy of this book from Net Galley in exchange for my honest opinion of it. I did not finish as it was too far fetched and reminded me of a lifetime movie.

I thought I was going to like this book more than I did. It wasn't bad by any stretch of the means. I liked the characters, the story kept me interested but not hooked, and the ending was just "okay". It almost felt like it had been done before. It is definitely something I would recommend for patrons who like domestic thrillers, but probably not something I would say gives you that "I need to read it RIGHT NOW" type of feeling.

This family drama/thriller is certainly well-plotted! From multiple perspectives, the story unfolds of Myra's missing daughter, Charlotte, and the woman who comes to the family inn twenty years later that Myra immediately identifies as her missing daughter. Elizabeth, the titular character, has escaped an abusive and isolating situation, but just when she starts to feel safe, it's clear that someone is still targeting her.

With unpredictable turns, this is a tough one to put down - but unfortunately, the style choices bog down the pacing a bit. With multiple perspectives, all told in third-person, present tense, there are some surprisingly beautifully vivid lines - but there are also some instances that really feel a bit too much like head-hopping for my taste. Some of the action - especially the climax of the book - feels chaotic and almost garbled by the formatting. It is an intriguing read, though. I feel like some tougher editing choices could have really helped this one become a stronger novel. The setting works well and, for the most part, the characters do come to life, even if their dialogue feels oddly stilted and stiff at times.

I liked this story overall! I had a little trouble keep characters straight at first, but I found myself getting pulled into each individual story line without much trouble. This was a quick-paced and intense read. Really enjoyed it and definitely going to recommend it. The author excels at keeping the reader off balance. There are twists throughout.

Call me Elizabeth Lark by Melissa Colasanti had real potential to be a great thriller, but it fell short. There are some good twists throughout but the ending was too quick and abrupt.

2.5 stars, rounded up
On the surface, this is an entertaining mystery--a young girl disappears and is never found. Her mother Myra has never given up hope that she is alive. Then one night, a woman appears at the family's seaside inn, child in tow, and claims to be that daughter who escaped from the captor who had been holding them all of these years. The reader knows that "Elizabeth Lark" is not Charlotte, the missing girl, but Myra thinks she looks exactly like what Charlotte would look like now and welcomes her back into the family.

There are some good twists to the story, but some of them are much too convenient and took the story beyond the realm of believability. I found the actions and dialogue of many of the characters to be way over the top and hysterical, particularly Myra. I felt badly for her remaining children, growing up in the shadow of their missing sister and their mother seeming to care more for Charlotte than her present children. I did like that the story alternated between Myra's, Elizabeth's, and Gwen's point of view, and I could identify with the person Gwen had grown up to be, the mother she ended up being to her own children. Those snippets from Gwen and her brother elevated the book for me, because they seemed very real.

One other quibble I had was the geography. I'm from the Pacific Northwest and I could never get a handle on the location of the book. The Inn is supposedly on the Oregon coast, and Elizabeth was being held in rural Washington, which took a long time to get to when she was leading the police there. But when she escaped, she seemed to get to the lady who helped her pretty quickly and then when she needed help from her later she seemed to be right there. I just couldn't figure out how any of it would have worked.

The mystery itself is also a bit too convenient and I had much of it figured out before things were revealed. But like I said, there were some good twists which make the reading of this book worthwhile. If you like thrillers and can suspend your disbelief a bit, this one is a decent choice.