Pretty Girls – Karin Slaughter

Genre: Mystery, Thriller
Publisher:William Morrow

Sisters. Strangers. Survivors.

More than twenty years ago, Claire and Lydia’s teenaged sister Julia vanished without a trace. The two women have not spoken since, and now their lives could not be more different. Claire is the glamorous trophy wife of an Atlanta millionaire. Lydia, a single mother, dates an ex-con and struggles to make ends meet. But neither has recovered from the horror and heartbreak of their shared loss—a devastating wound that’s cruelly ripped open when Claire’s husband is killed.

The disappearance of a teenage girl and the murder of a middle-aged man, almost a quarter-century apart: what could connect them? Forming a wary truce, the surviving sisters look to the past to find the truth, unearthing the secrets that destroyed their family all those years ago . . . and uncovering the possibility of redemption, and revenge, where they least expect it.

Wow. What an incredible novel. This book is everything I’ve wanted to read since Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn. Flynn is one of my absolute favourite writers in the Mystery/Crime genres. There are so many mediocre or subpar writers within that genre that it’s worth noting when you stumble across a writer almost as talented as Flynn.

Pretty Girls is a disturbing story about the disappearance of a young woman and how it shaped the lives and future of her family. Slaughter’s choice of telling the story from three differing perspectives could have easily ruined the story had the writing been not as compelling as it is. Each perspective offers something different to the story being told.

From the first page to the last I was hooked. Usually with these types of novels, it takes me a few chapters to fully invest in the characters and story being laid out. However, Slaughter’s writing hooked from the first line.

“When you first disappeared, your mother warned me that finding out exactly what had happened to you would be worse that never knowing. We argued about this constantly because arguing was the only thing that held us together at the time.”

The story then evolves into something akin to a car crash that you cannot look away from. It’s disgusting, disturbing, and triggering but, oh so, clever. All the pieces align perfectly to create a truly masterful story about your worst fears come to life about missing women.

Overall, Pretty Girls is the perfect read for fans impatiently waiting for Gillian Flynn’s next masterpiece. I kept my review purposely vague because it’s best to experience this novel with no story expectations.