Just about a year ago, I read and reviewed Almost Missed You, the debut novel by Jessica Strawser (whose day job is Editorial Director for Writer’s Digest magazine, so expectations were high) . I liked it. A LOT. Five stars, although noting it was more a beach read than “literature.” I hadn’t quite decided whether Jessica was a one-hit-wonder, but I had high hopes when I received her latest, Not That I Could Tell (thanks to St. Martin’s Press and NetGalley).
This one is set in the small town of Yellow Springs, Ohio. The basic plotline is that a group of neighborhood women have a semi-spontaneous get-together one Saturday evening, gathering around Clara’s backyard firepit (all of them happy to learn their baby monitors get reception at that distance!)
Clara lives next door to Paul ad his wife Kristin, a young mother of twins. The Saturday gathering turns out to be the last time anyone saw Kristin, who has disappeared along with her twins.
It turns into a media circus, making me wonder if it was another Gone Girl ripoff…but this one is different. There is an investigation into the disappearannce, complete with suspected husband, but this is much more than a police procedural. The story focuses on several characters, with Clara and the newest addition to the neighborhood, Izzy, at the center. The stories of these two women are spooled out while we look at the events leading up to the fateful Saturday night.
Yellow Springs is a small town, and that means everyone is up in everyone else’s business. Speculation is rampant as to whether Kristin and the kids left willingly, or whether Paul could have been involved. I loved the way the womens’ characters were developed, and the depth of knowledge that is revealed about them both. Izzy was the stronger character for me, and I enjoyed the way the message of the importance of speaking up and never assuming another person really knows your true feelings was presented (it was revealed gradually, rather than being dumped in the reader’s lap).
Hard to say more without spoiling it (which I NEVER do, but I recommend it highly as an entertaining, well-written example of (women’s fiction (a term I hate, and not to be confused with “chick lit,” which I hate even more.
Five stars. I am definitely now a Jessica Strawser fan.