What Happens Next by Christina Suzann Nelson is a complexly structured novel that explores what happened after a child goes missing. Even with two timelines and three POVs (Heather, Dora, and Faith), I never felt lost within this story. Did I have questions that demanded answers just as the main characters did? Oh, yes! Podcaster Faith spends her summer back in the small town where her childhood took a turn. Faith’s best friend went missing and there are no answers to the mystery until Faith starts asking questions. Dora believes her daughter is still out there somewhere and lives her life waiting for her return. Life has gone on around her, but she is stuck in the past. Both of these characters do not forget the pivotal event that changed their lives. The story shifts between the present day and the summer when Faith went missing. Faith, the missing friend and daughter, tells her story in a first person voice. I loved that. Faith becomes real, not a long gone character that others tell about. Perspectives from adults and children are important to understand just went on that summer. This truly is a story of what comes next after tragedy and loss, even when no answers are to be found.

What Happens Next is an excellent book. Perfect for a book club discussion, you will want to talk about this book!

Highly Recommended.

Great for Book Clubs.

Audience: Adults.

This is my first book by Christina Suzann Nelson but I'll definitely be looking for more in the future. I quickly became engaged in the story of Faith and her missing childhood friend Heather. Once I started I didn't want to stop!

Rebecca Quinn Robertson narrated this audio book and she did a great job!

Thank you Netgalley for the opportunity to read and review. All opinions are my own.

Publication date: 17 January 2023

I found myself totally sucked into this book, I needed to know what happened to Heather. This was my first book by Christina Suzann Nelson and it won't be my last! I appreciated how invested she made me in the story and all the faith elements she wove throughout.

Great story that pulls you in and makes you want to keep reading. Loved the characters and the mystery. It was fun to go on the journey with the characters and to solve the mystery with them.

I received a complimentary book from publishers, publicists, and or authors.  A review was not required and all opinions and ideas expressed are my own.

This book contained a cat named Crouton. How cute is that?! Definitely a highlight.

Beyond that, this story was gut-wrenching and highly emotional—just my sort of story. It revolved around the disappearance of a childhood friend. Turned out, it was a cold missing persons case. It was completely fascinating, as I hadn’t seen this sort of mystery delivered in the time-slip fashion before. The way the mystery unfolded felt like a psychological thriller at times, which was definitely up my alley. I’d love a lot more stories like this one in the Christian-fiction market.

Detective Masters’s humor was charming.

One minor blip: I found it odd that it was claimed that an iPhone had to use AirPods. Maybe the newer ones are like that, but I’ve known some iPhones to be compatible with wired headphones. The newness of the phone was not established that I saw, so I was confused by this inconsistency with my reality.

I wept my way through the climax and finale. Buckets and buckets of tears, y’all. This book was so good. I’m adding it to my reread list for when I’m craving a reread of a favorite story, that’s for sure.

Content: profanity, expletive, tobacco, suicide, tattoos

Thank you NetGalley for allowing me to receive this book for an honest review.

I have not any of Christina Suzann Nelsons books and I am glad I received this one. I found this book to grab me from the beginning. It has a lot of mystery and had me at the edge of my seat.

I highly recommend this one.

True crime podcaster and mother Faith Byrne is newly and unhappily divorced. She’s even less happy when her ex wants to take her two daughters to Hawaii for the three whole months of summer, not just the short holiday she’s originally agreed so they could attend their father’s wedding.

But that does mean she’s free and unencumbered when she gets a strange request from the sister of a childhood best friend. Back when she was ten, she’d spent a summer at her grandmother’s house in Deep Valley, Oregon, where she’d befriended Heather, the girl next door.

Despite their promises to write, Heather never replied to any of Faith’s letters. Now Faith finds out why: Heather disappeared a matter of days after Faith left Deep Valley. And her parents never told her.

That got me hooked. The story itself was told from three points of view: Faith, Dori (Heather’s mother, who is still grieving for her lost daughter and can’t understand why everyone else – including her husband – has moved on), and Heather herself, from 1986.

We therefore saw Health and Faith becoming friends at the same time as we saw Faith searching for her lost friend. It was an effective way to unravel the mystery and show Faith’s investigation.

While I enjoy a good crime novel, I’m not a fan of true crime novels (or nonfiction). True crime has real victims, and I’d much rather engage my imagination with make-believe than dwell on something that actually happened to someone … and which left behind mourning family and friends.

I think this is why I liked and appreciated Faith’s take on true crime: because she wasn’t focusing on the crime. She was focusing on the people. Her listeners expected stories of hope and healing, of people who fought through loss to come out stronger and still maintaining compassion and wholeness.

I’d describe What Happens Next as dual timeline women’s fiction with a touch of mystery. We did find out what happened to Heather, although I didn’t think the mystery was the main focus. It was more a story of relationships, particularly marriage, and grief.

Recommended for those who enjoy well-written novels with great characters.

Thanks to Bethany House and NetGalley for providing a free ebook for review.

Faith is coming to terms with the fact that her marriage has just ended and what that means for her and her children moving forward. Her ex is taking the kids for the summer, leaving her with nothing to do, until she receives an unexpected phone call from someone in her past. Her childhood friend Heather has been missing for years, and her help is needed to find out what has happened to her. Through the use of her podcast, she decides to head back to the small town and try to solve the mystery - she owes it to Heathers family to get some closure after all they did to make her feel welcome in their family as a child.

This is the first book I’ve read from this author and I honestly was hooked from the beginning of the story. It was one of those books that I couldn’t put down until I got the answers I was looking for. The author was able to invite the reader in on the feelings of the characters - grief, loss, hope, closure - the reader was able to experience all of it alongside them. I also liked that the author included the element of Christian faith in the story, I feel like it added more depth. The author included Heather’s story throughout the book, mingling it with the present day story told by Faith and I liked that because as we got closer to finding out what happened in Heather’s story, it began to line up with the information Faith was finding out. Overall it was a really good book, I have nothing negative to say. I look forward to reading more books by this author in the future.

Thank you to NetGalley for the opportunity to read this book in exchange for my honest, unbiased review.

Technically 4 1/2 stars. I thought the story was a little slow moving but it was a great story about the many types of grief and healing from them. In 1987 Faith stayed with her grandma and met Heather and her family, now 36 years later Faith finds out that Heather has been missing all this time. Brooke, Heather's sister, asks Faith to use her podcast What Happens Next to investigate this cold case and try to find closure for the family. In the process we see many types of grief: a failed marriage, lost friendship, loss of a friend, loss of a sibling, loss of a child, etc. Each character deals with grief in their own way. The story is more than a mystery involving a cold case, it's also about healing and renewing old friendships and learning and growing from our mistakes.

This was a hard book to read.

Only because as a mother, this is your worst fear. Your child doesn't come home one night...
This story pulled at my heart strings and made me cry so many tears. But in all that, there was hope and healing, faith growing through the pain and loss.

The story is very well written, the love interest gentle and background - which was very appropriate given the subject matter. The story kept my attention and kept me up past my bedtime, needing to finish and find out the ending. In the end, I feel satisfied.

Thanks to #Netgalley for a copy of this book, in exchange for an honest review.

As soon as I heard the word podcast, I knew I had to read it. It has short chapters and is told by 3 points of view. The writing was engaging and loved hearing about the 80's.

LOVED this engrossing story! Nelson has consistently become one of my favorite authors who chooses to walk toward challenging topics and address them with hope, faith, and grace. If you've never read Nelson's work before, What Happens Next is a great place to start--then, go back and read her other outstanding novels!

I was an early reader, thanks to the publisher. All opinions are my own and I was not required to leave a review.

A child went missing 36 years before the time the book was set in. Recent divorcée and MC, Faith, is a podcast host and was also the best friend of missing child, Heather. Faiths children go on a trip with their father for the summer, so she decides to accept an offer that puts her back in the town that Heather went missing in so many years before.

Faith sets out to shed light on the missing persons case through her podcast. The story is told through the POV of Faith, Heather, and also Dora (Heather’s mom). I enjoyed the POV of Faith the most. Heathers POV was written in a way that was accurate for a child’s perspective. Doras character irritated me at times, but grew on me by the end.

It’s a great story of the way the Lord works in realistic tragic situations, and I’d recommend it to friends. Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC.

Thank you to Christina Suzann Nelson for my advanced reader copy. I was not required to leave a positive review. All views given are my own.

The book shifts between 1987 and present day. It is set in Oregon.

The book mainly centers around Faith Byrne, Dora Crane, and Heather Crane. It is told from each person's perspective. 1987 for Heather and 1987 and present day for Faith and Dora.

Faith Byrne is a popular podcaster. She tells stories of triumph after tragedy. Her own life has not followed the same path. Faith is recently divorced. Her ex-husband is taking her two daughters to Hawaii with him. He's getting remarried while he's there. Faith expects to have a long and lonely summer. Everything changes when she gets a special request to highlight a thirty-six-year-old case. The case is deeply personal. Thirty-six years ago, her best friend Heather vanished. She agrees to help.

Dora Crane has never accepted that her younger daughter might be dead. She has kept her home looking exactly the same as when Heather disappeared. She has never given up hope for a happy reunion. All of this causes a breakdown of her family. Her husband moves out. Her older daughter decides to intervene. She wants Dora to seek counseling and pack up Heather's belongings. She also invited Faith to help them.

The book shows the friendship Faith and Heather had before the disappearance. It moves into modern times and shows Faith and Dora digging to find answers. It shows the grief and healing each one goes through. It shows how God works in our lives to bring healing and hope.

What Happens Next by Christina Suzann Nelson is the best book I have read this year. It is a book I could not put down. And now that I finished it, I cannot stop thinking about it. The characters were real and raw. The childhood flashbacks and subsequent events were so believable. Reading this novel, it truly came alive and did not feel like fiction. I highly recommend this book. Wow. I received a digital copy of this book from the publisher with no obligations. These opinions are entirely my own.

Closer to three and a half stars.
A podcaster returns to her grandmother’s home, where she spent time as a child, to try to find out what happened to her childhood best friend who went missing years earlier.
This was pretty engaging, for the most part, but dragged a little about the halfway point.
I did appreciate that there was no over-the-top, ridiculous climax scene.
Thanks to #netgalley and #bethanyhousepublishers for this #arc of #whathappensnext in exchange for an honest review.

What Happens Next
by Christina Suzann Nelson
Pub Date 17 Jan 2023
Bethany House, Bethany House Publishers
Christian | Mystery & Thrillers | Women's Fiction


I am reviewing a copy of What Happens Next through Bethany House Publishers and Netgalley:


Faith Byrne is a popular podcaster and ex-reporter who made a name for herself telling stories of greatness after tragedy--but her real life does not mirror the stories she tells. Her daughters are spending the summer in Hawaii with her ex-husband and his new wife, she must manage life on her own. All of that changes when she's asked to spotlight her childhood best friend's missing person case on her podcast.



Dora Crane has never accepted that her younger daughter could be dead, keeping her home looking the same as when her daughter disappeared. But when her husband leaves her and her older daughter intervenes, she agrees to counseling and to pack up her missing daughter's belongings under one condition: Faith Byrne comes to Deep Valley and sheds light on the cold case.


The long abandoned investigation finally moves forward, while old wounds and long-buried secrets are exposed. Will these two women, whose lives have never been the same, finally get the answers they need to reconcile the past and the future?



I give What Happens Next five out of five stars!


Happy Reading!

What Happens Next feels like I walked back into my childhood. Nelson captures the feeling of the late 1980s in a way that brought me back to childhood summers. It didn’t hurt that the backdrop of the story was set in my home state. I struggled at first with the multiple viewpoints and with whether I wanted Heather to be found alive. There are no good outcomes with an extended abduction and 36 years of separation would be a lot to overcome. By the end, I was fully engaged and invested in the outcome for all of the characters. Unfortunately, work delayed my ability to finish the last hour of reading. I would definitely recommend and look forward to reading more from this author.

I really enjoyed this book. The story moves along at a good pace and keeps you wanting to solve the case. The story centers on a woman who does a podcast about people who thrive after tragedy. When her childhood best friend’s sister asks her to investigate and look into the disappearance of her sister and this woman’s best friend, she decides to help. She goes back to the town she lived in when she was in 5th grade and starts digging. The book goes back and forth in time from 30 years before to present and also different characters point of view. It’s easy to follow and flows perfectly. ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

This is my first book to read by this author and I can guarantee you it will not be the last one. I thoroughly enjoyed it. It was an exciting and intriguing pulse pounding mystery that had so many twists and turns it just kept me glued to my kindle. Great plot, great characters and believable happenings. It was a gripping mystery with a bit of romance that had me hooked from the beginning all the way to the satisfying ending.....I was given an e-copy from the publisher and this is my honest review.