This is a page turner through all the nostalgia of the late 70s, the 80s and 90s, and all across the map of America, chasing down missing girls and pressing into strangely linked cold cases.

The literary writing, simple language speckled with brilliance, is the gem of this story. The story itself is quite sad, quite ugly. But it is tragic beauty, full of hope and love and brilliant colour. In the midst of tragedy, there are fairytales and pirate adventures and the innocence of children and the sad realities of continued social injustice. 

It doesn’t grip you quite instantly —though it grips you, in a way— but then slowly inches hooks into your heart, and then it steals you away you in the final third and won’t let go until that brilliant end.

And what an ending…