It happens quietly one August morning. As dawn's shimmering light drenches the humid Iowa air, two families awaken to find their little girls have gone missing in the night.
Seven-year-old Calli Clark is sweet, gentle, a dreamer who suffers from selective mutism brought on by tragedy that pulled her deep into silence as a toddler.
Calli's mother, Antonia, tried to be the best mother she could within the confines of marriage to a mostly absent, often angry husband. Now, though she denies that her husband could be involved in the possible abductions, she fears her decision to stay in her marriage has cost her more than her daughter's voice.
Petra Gregory is Calli's best friend, her soul mate and her voice. But neither Petra nor Calli has been heard from since their disappearance was discovered. Desperate to find his child, Martin Gregory is forced to confront a side of himself he did not know existed beneath his intellectual, professorial demeanor.
Now these families are tied by the question of what happened to their children. And the answer is trapped in the silence of unspoken family secrets.
To be perfectly honest, the only reason why I bought this book was because Amazon kept recommending it to me. For almost a year, it seemed like almost every time I ordered a book, Amazon would come back and say if I liked that one, I'd like this one too. I don't normally like stories about missing children - I find them too disturbing - but this one was good.
I can't say much about the plot without giving it away, but I will say it was a new take on this sort of story. The focus is more on Callie and her family than it is on Petra. For Callie, the question is more about what led to her disappearance than where she was, and for Petra the question was where she'd gone. Actually, I was almost finished the book before I understood what was going on with Petra. It's more Callie's story, but Petra is an integral part that helps tie everything up at the end. Good book.
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