This is my second read from Charlie Donlea, I truly love his style. This story was very interesting, and I was engaged from the very beginning. Dr. Sloan Hastings is part of a prestigious fellowship on her way to becoming a forensic pathologist- she just has to learn about forensic genealogy.

So riveting. Decades old cold cases.
I listened to the audio book and I loved the narrator.

This was my first Charlie Donlea book, I have heard so many people like him. This particular book was just ok for me, there were too many characters. At one point, I didn't know who we were even talking about. Also how the pictures happened was just too much for me.

I’m on a roll this month with great books, so it was no surprise to me that my most recent read by Charlie Donlea was another winner and a 5 star read for me.

This is my second book by this author and like TWENTY YEARS LATER ( a fav ) his newest had me hooked from page one.

The FMC Sloan Hastings is embarking on a two year fellowship in forensic pathology under the renowned Dr. Livia Cutty (from Donlea’s book The Girl Who Was Taken - which I have to read now! ). The area of interest she has been given-Forensic and Investigative Genealogy. It’s the DNA Science that has solved a few high profile cold cases in the last few years, most notably that of “The Golden State Killer”. She is to make a case furthering this method.

In an attempt to better understand the controversial Sloan reluctantly submits her own DNA, with her adoptive parents permission. And yup the results are SHOCKING!

Her DNA profile suggests that her true identity is that of “Charlotte Margolis”aka Baby Charlotte who captured the nation’s attention in July of 1995 when she and her parents mysteriously disappeared never to be seen or heard from again.

Until NOW.

When Sloan discovers her history she immediately reaches out to her adoptive parents and then she has to get the FBI involved. This leads to her finding her birth family. And boy…they are a piece of work!

This is a tale full of family secrets, family drama and pure lies!

Also, the narrator, Vivienne Leheny, did an amazing job. I love that she narrated Twenty Years Later by the author, as well as The New Couple in 5B by Lisa Unger. Definitely a narrator to look out for.

Ps. If you’re looking for a a good story which may have you questioning your DNA…THIS IS IT! I definitely recommend treating yourself to a copy today,

I also want to thank the author himself, the tagged publisher and RB Media for my reader advanced listening copy.

Charlie Donlea does it again with another great crime thriller that I could not stop listening to! I love how Donlea incorporated modern themes like DNA testing and crime, adoption inequities, and the influence of money and power into this novel. I could see how this particular novel could turn into a series featuring Sloane with her current training as a forensic pathologist (as well as the romantic undertones with more than one character), and I would be all in on that series. I loved the dual settings in Nevada and North Carolina as well as the dual timelines. I wasn't totally in love with the way things ended, but I did love how the whole book unfolded.

I don’t typically describe books as riveting, but this absolutely was! Charlie Donlea’s Long Time Gone starts with a murder. Years later, we meet Dr. Sloan Hastings, who has a fellowship in forensic pathology.

After submitting her own DNA, she finds out that she may be closer to a disappearance and murder than she could have ever imagined. This had it all - intrigue, twists, family drama, and the science was so good!

The narration by Vivienne Leheny was absolute perfection - crisp with clear distinctions for different characters. An excellent read!

Many of us are super interested in learning who proceeded us with some facing life altering surprises.

Such was the case with Dr Sloan Hastings, a woman enmeshed in the study of forensic pathology. She submits her DNA to a genealogy site only to find out her connection to a baby's disappearance thirty years ago. Sloan was adopted so the possibilities seemed endless but then when she finds that she is the long missing Charlotte Margolis who with her family disappeared thirty years ago without a trace.

Lots of mystery surrounds the Margolis family, and as Sloan heads to Cedar Creek, Nevada, she unleashes a look back in time and involves Sheriff Eric Stamos, whose father died mysteriously investigating the Margolis family.

Lots of family secrets seem to be buried in the graveyard of the family and although some are thrilled with Sloan's return, there are others who might wish her death.

Very quick paced and intense, the theme of genealogy and DNA is both fascinating and revels secrets long thought of as dead and forgotten.

Thank you to Charlie Donlea, Recorded Books, and NetGalley for a copy of this story already published/

Charlie Donlea gives us another great police procedural book with LONG TIME GONE. This story quickly hooked me and kept me entertained throughout. I loved reading about how DNA has helped solve crimes and how it impacted the characters in this story. The short chapters made for a plot that moved along quickly and overall I was happy with where the story went. I definitely recommend this one if police procedural type stories are of interest to you. The audiobook narration was great. The narrator did a wonderful job differentiating voices and performing the story in an entertaining way. I really liked this audiobook!

Sloan is training to become a medical pathologist to work in the morgue. She has been given an assignment to understand how DNA works and how you can catch a killer based on using your relatives' samples. In order to complete this assignment, she must submit her own DNA samples to the ancestry website. Sloan knows she is adopted, but she's not ready for the information she will come to find out about how she became to be adopted and what is in store for her next
Will this unfounded family be friends or foes. Will they accept her with open arms, or will she find herself wishing she had never submitted her DNA to the ancestry website

Almost three decades after a baby and her parents go missing in Nevada, forensic scientist Sloan Hastings discovers through DNA testing that she is that missing baby.

This mystery/thriller was fast paced and full of twists and turns that had me guessing until the end. My only complaint is that the audiobook narrator sounded a bit robotic at times.

4.5 stars.

This story kept me engaged and wanting answers all the way until the end. This was my first from this author and I'm very much looking forward to checking out more of his work. The characters were well written and I loved how the twists all came together. I received an audiobook copy via NetGalley and absolutely loved the narration.

This was an excellent audiobook with a great narrator. It had really good pacing.

Donlea does a really nice job of weaving a story together and keeping me interested from start to finish. The pacing was spot on.

The characters were so fun to root for and the villains were just so…villainy.

I also enjoy how there are real life references to true crime in his books. In this particular book he talks about the Golden State Killer and the advances in DNA that led to his arrest and conviction.

Another thing you can count on with this author is people getting what they deserve. That’s why the conclusions to his books are so satisfying.

Just like his prior books, this one would make a great movie.

This was my 3rd book by this author, and I can’t wait to read more in the future, his writing is consistently good. Def achieved auto-buy status for me. I

Long Time Gone was my first novel by Charlie Donlea and it will not be my last! This novel caught my attention from the beginning and sustained it throughout! With great character development and an exciting plot line it was the perfect recipe for a gripping suspense novel. I look forward to reading more from Charlie Donlea!

The narration in this audio book was spot on and also added to my enjoyment of the storyline. The pacing and delivery was perfect!
This novel and audiobook is now available!
Thank you Net Galley, Charlie Donlea, RB Media for the opportunity to preview this title and the opinions shared are my own.

I’ll be honest. I was all about this until the extra hitch of the podcast was thrown in. Then it all just became frustrating and too much. It’s really too bad. The writing was good, and Sloane was an ok protagonist. She was smart and only made slightly silly choices as is the norm for the thriller genre.

In 1995, a couple and their infant daughter disappeared. They were from a rich family in Nevada and seemed to have disappeared without a trace. No one ever figures out what happens to them. Thirty years later, Dr. Sloan Hastings is participating in a fellowship in the medical examiners office in North Carolina. When DNA is submitted to a genealogy website, it links to the missing baby. How did the missing child end up being Sloan? And who was involved in her being adopted? And where are her birth parents. Sloan finds out that her mother was briefly a suspect in a murder and the local Sheriff's father (who was also the Sheriff) mysteriously died. Are these are related?

Long Time Gone follows Sloan's quest to find answers as to what happened to her parents and how she came to belong to her adoptive parents. This was my first Charlie Donlea book and it definitely won't be my last. This book was expertly plotted, with twists and turns that were expertly written. The characters were well developed. The actions scenes were well-written and the dialogue was really good. I thoroughly enjoyed this book. I listened to the audio and the narrator was also fantastic. If you like a good mystery, I highly recommend this book. And if you're an audio book person, give this one a listen.

I received an ARC of the audio book from NetGalley and received no compensation in exchange for this review. The opinions contained herein are mine and mine alone.

LONG TIME GONE was wonderfully crafted, twisty, suspenseful, and held my attention from start to finish. True crime lovers will appreciate the use of genealogy/ancestry websites, and how it opens up a cold case that’s been sitting stagnant for thirty years! It really is amazing what we can uncover from DNA testing nowadays. I especially loved all of the family drama, secrets, lies, and rich people (allegedly) behaving badly. And oddly enough, I actually liked the majority of the characters in this novel! Ha! That doesn’t happen very often with thrillers. This was my first read from Donlea, but definitely won’t be my last. I’ve been hearing amazing things about TWENTY YEARS LATER, so I’ll probably read that one in the near future. Overall, LONG TIME GONE is a solid thriller, indeed!

Dr. Sloan submits her DNA to an online genealogy site for a research. She was adopted and hesitant to learn about her birth parents but what she uncovers is much more than what she bargained for. 30 years ago, she and her birth parents went missing and never heard of again. The website links her to the prominent family Margolis of Cedar Creek, Nevada. She embarks on a journey to discover what truly happened to her birth parents.

I enjoyed this book, the jaw dropping twists and turns of the book were such a great ride. ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Thank you NetGalley, Charlie Donlea and RB Media for the ARC!

Out Now! Thank you to the publisher for the audio ARC via Netgalley!

This was good, but I'm an outlier with my rating for sure. There are tons of 4-5 stars for this and I think a lot of readers will love it.

For me it is a 3 star. One of the big reasons for this is the over-explanations and repetitiveness. Like, are we just trying to fill pages with words now? You can simply say Sloan loves to work out and do CrossFit. I don't need a multiple paragraph explanation of the exact form of a clean and jerk or how she moves the battle ropes.....just, no. ALSO it took me so far out of the story when Sloan asked all these stupid questions about film photography. Bitch, you are not THAT young, you know about film photos/ disposable cameras, all the girls around that time had them. (facepalms and eyerolls)

All that said -- I REALLY LIKED the backbone of this story: genealogy being used in forensics and crime solving! The explanations on that topic, fine -- it matters to the story. This got twisted and wild real quick towards the end. I liked most of this story but some things really just made me SMH so hard, lol.

There are lots of characters introduced and some of them are just a tiny plot driver; also some of them are seriously unlikable (I cannot get on board with the actions of that podcaster character, yuck). There were also a few plot points that didn't get resolved (like the FBI leak.... what ever came of that?)

I would recommend to readers that love:
-multi-timeline
-genealogy and family history
-decades old mystery
-descriptive writing

Thank you NetGalley for this ARC of Long Time Gone!
Let's dive right into this one, Sloane is currently in school to become a ME and her big assignment is a research project on how to use online genealogy forums to solve past crimes/ cold cases.
While Sloane has always known she's adopted she never looked too far into her birth family history as she had a wonderful upbringing, and its importance was not all that relevant. But when she uses her own DNA to create a genealogy profile for her project... it unfolds in front of her that she is the infamous Charolette Margolis who went missing with her parents back in 1995.
Now she gets involved with meeting her birth family and all unfolds of what happened to her parents back in 95. While I did feel I had the story figured out it did slightly change, and I was not entirely spot on. However aside from that this book was fast paced, high suspense, thrilling, gripping, and held my attention the whole time.
The audio was wonderful, and I binged thru this book so fast!
I 10/10 recommend this book to all whom are thriller lovers and have intertest in the science side of genetics!

Long Time Gone by Charlie Donlea and narrated by Vivienne Leheny is a gripping thriller that had me glued to my earbuds and shooing away real life until the very last minute

Vivienne Leheny brings the characters into your space and keeps you mesmerised, a perfect balance with Charlie Donlea's exceptional storytelling

Imagine you are about to start a 2 year fellowship on your road to becoming a forensic pathologist when a routine DNA test as part of your research turns out that you were the infant of a family that went missing nearly 30 years previously. But that is not all, the disappearance was national news due to the family name, a very famous and influential family name

Oh my life I adored this audiobook! The deception and intrigue of the Margolis family was so well written and I did not have a clue which way to turn. The slow burn with Eric is a tiny glimmer of the story, but still a high point. Sloans adopted parents were so sweet and Sloan herself, perfect. A heroine who is fitness focussed, but more about using her brain and not afraid to be real and down to earth

Fantastic!

Thank you to Netgalley, RB Media, the author Charlie Donlea and narrator Vivienne Leheny for this stunning ALC. My review is left voluntarily and all opinions are my own

This is the first book by this author I have ever read. I love discovering new authors and this one is definitely one I won’t forget. I enjoyed how this story unfolded.

Sloan is a forensic trainee and her project for the year is genetic information that has solved cold cases. To better understand her project, Sloan submits her DNA to an ancestry website. Sloan knew she was adopted but she had no idea she was stolen!

When Sloan discovers her history she immediately reaches out to her adoptive parents and then she has to get the FBI involved. This leads to her finding her birth family. And boy…they are a piece of work!

This is a tale full of family secrets, family drama and pure lies!

The narrator, Vivienne Leheny, did a fabulous job. I will be on the lookout for her!

Need a good story which may have you questioning your DNA…THIS IS IT! Grab your copy today

I received this novel from the publisher for a honest review.