Just Jennifer

Don’t Try to Find Me by Holly Brown (William Morrow, July 2014)

In the tradition of recent novels filled with family secrets, disappearing family members and social media, Don’t Try to Find Me begins as one story and quickly turns into something else.  Rachel comes home one day and finds a message on the white board from her fourteen-year-old daughter Marley “Don’t try to find me.  I’ll be okay. I’ll be better. I love you.”  Rachel is certain that Marley would never run away and her certainty is confirmed when she finds Marley’s phone on the counter.  The local police are not so convinced that Marley hasn’t run away and by their own admission have limited resources to help Rachel and Paul find their daughter.  Paul immediately launches a social media campaign, starting the website FindMarley.com; Paul and Rachel are not ready for the national spotlight that they find themselves, especially Rachel who is hiding something, caught up in something that will change everything and everyone’s perception of the family and their version of events. Don’t Try to Find Me is a suspenseful debut, but not in the way I originally expected: what beings as the story of Marley and her disappearance turns into the story of a family that is in distress but doesn't realize it.   It is a little disappointing that much about Marley’s disappearance is revealed early on, but as the focus shifts to Rachel and her secrets, the tension begins to mount again and the plot is revitalized.