THE PERFECT STRANGER BY MEGAN MIRANDA

This follow up to the first book "All the Missing Girls" was a much anticipated book that I have been Looking forward to reading. Sadly, this one didn't live up to all its hype. The reason is because the conclusion of the book was just too long and dragged out. I really am disappointed because the first book was so good. This needed some serious editing out the second half of the book.

Leah is set up by her friend Emmy who steals her identity. Basically that's it. Leah used to work for a news paper in Boston. Because of her reporting about her friend's husband causing suicides she runs away with Emmy to Pennsylvania. Emmy disappears without a trace. The remainder of the book is Leah trying to find Emmy. The story could have more to the plot and the character's could have been better developed. Emmy isn't developed at all.

I know Author's put a lot of labor into writing a book. I am sorry this one was so simplistic and rushed.

Thank you to Net Galley, Megan Miranda and Simon & Schuster for my digital Copy in exchange for an honest and fair review.

Unfortunately this was not as good as her last book. I could not relate to the main character and I felt this book just dragged and took to long to get to the end. The main character Leah is lost as she doesn't know what she wants with her life anymore. Things end bad in Boston and thinking an old friend has come to help her, she moves. Her life spirals more out of control once she moves and her old friend goes missing. The real question through this whole book is who is Emmy and is she real. By the end you find out who Emmy really is but really I didn't care then or earlier in the book. I really loved All the Missing Girls and was really disappointed with this book.


*Thank you NetGalley for letting me read this for my honest opinion*

I received a copy of The Perfect Stranger through NetGalley for an honest review. Many thanks to Simon & Schuster and Megan Miranda for the opportunity.

I absolutely loved Megan Miranda's last book All the Missing Girls so I had very high hopes for this one. All the Missing Girls was so unique and at the top of my favorites list for 2016. I was not at all disappointed with The Perfect Stranger. This book is great!

How well can you ever really know another person? This becomes a question of life and death when Leah Stevens, a disgraced reporter, leaves Boston, seemingly on a whim, with long-lost friend Emmy Grey and takes on a teaching position at a high school in western Pennsylvania. Miranda does a great job of uncovering the true and very dark story one tiny piece at a time through many different characters.

I was left guessing with every turn of the page. The characters are not the normal thriller type characters who you dislike. You felt for Leah and you were rooting for her to figure out what on earth was going on! The Perfect Stranger will definitely keep you guessing until the end.. A must read for all Megan Miranda fans!

Thank you so much NetGalley for the ARC of this book. Thank you Simon & Schuster.

Megan Miranda does this again! This is a follow up to All the Missing Girls.

Leah Stevens needs to get away from the city. She reconnects with an old friend and moves to a rural town to become a teacher. There's an eerie crime committed where the victim resembles Leah, and at the same time, her roommate disappears. Leah, using her journalist instincts, begins to dig deeper. Everyone in the town has something to hide. Leah starts to uncover secrets about Emmy and wonders if she is who she has claimed to be.
What I loved about this book was how the mystery was subtle, yet it still left me on the age of my seat. That's not easy to do. It was not overpowering like some suspenseful novels can be and this had me hooked.

I looked back at my review for All the Missing Girls, and I liked this book so much more. Let yourself soak into the story and don't force it. The mystery will come along.

I thoroughly enjoyed Megan Miranda's newest twisty turny new psychological thriller, in fact, I liked it more than the first. There were times I was so confused that I had to go back and re-read portions of this book. Amazingly, it didn't deter or take away from my enjoyment of the novel. It was like piecing together a puzzle right along with our protagonist, Leah Stevens.
Leah can't seem to find a place where trouble doesn't follow her. She has run away from a sticky situation in Boston as her life as a journalist comes to a disheartening end. Leah tries to pick up the pieces in a new town by starting a new life with an old friend, and beginning a new career. But, trouble isn't far behind, and once again Leah's life takes a terrible turn.
Who can she trust when she can't even trust yourself? Who can she run to when she is not even sure of her own memories? Who will believe her when she is not even sure she believes herself? Will her skills as a journalist help her uncover the truth(s) or will they end up shunning her from yet another community and career? Or, will the truth unveiled be the end of the road for Leah?
Great read with a satisfying ending.
Definitely recommended.

I really enjoyed this book! It kept me guessing until the end. The characters were well developed and it read this within a couple of days because I wanted to see what happened! I would recommend this to friends for sure. Thank you for letting me read it!

I enjoyed this book although I was not totally convinced that the 'willo the wisp' character would exist in this day and age. It was a necessarily confusing plot that become unraveled slowly. I did not understand the logic of the character and because of this I did not believe in her.

Her first book was my favorite book of 2016. Did this one compare???? Pretty close let me tell ya. This story is so twisty and fiendishly plotted,it really genuinely messes with your head.When I finished reading it I was totally blown away and confused. (but in a good way)

Meh.
All the Missing Girls proved Megan Miranda was a brilliant writer, but Perfect Stranger felt undeveloped and forced. The pieces were all there; inspiring characters, an intriguing plot, well developed voice, but the parts simply didn't come together to make a cohesive whole.... It was like making a cake and forgetting the eggs. I will continue to watch this author because I bejeebees she had the talent to write another spectacular novel. This one just wasn't it.

I'm going to need to start this review off by telling you that I read this book this morning while I was in church. Now, I'm not normally one to slack off on my churchin', but Megan had me hooked and I needed to know the things!

I was a huge, huge fan of All the Missing Girls, and was really excited to get this one through NetGalley. Leah Stevens is starting over. After being pushed out of her last job for writing an article that ended in disaster she moved to a small Pennsylvania town with a roommate she hadn't seen in eight years.

From my perspective, Leah is kind of a loner. She's got some demons to live with but she's also got a lot of goodness in her. She wants to see the best in others, which is probably a huge flaw in her character. Leah trusts Emmy enough to leave her life behind and not to ask any questions about, well, anything. Okay, maybe Leah is kind of blind to people around her sometimes.

When Emmy disappears, things get weirder. A girl in town has been assaulted, Leah is being stalked by someone, and Emmy is gone, so enter Kyle Donovan. Kyle is also trying to make a name for himself as a detective and the lead on a case that now involves Leah. Things definitely get heated between them, but while Kyle tries to keep things professional Leah begins an investigation of her own.

This story definitely kept me guessing that's for damn sure. I wanted to know what was going on inside Leah's head and I kept wondering if she had secrets to tell, as Kyle wondered the same thing. I liked the rollercoaster of their relationship and just the cleverness of Leah. She'd lost everything and was on the verge of having everything taken from her and she fought for what she wanted. I loved that. Leah didn't back down from anything and, in the end, everyone got what they deserved.

Megan Miranda is quickly becoming one of my favorites.

Thanks to NetGalley and Simon & Schuster for the ARC.

Thank you Netgalley for an advance copy of The Perfect Stranger in exchange for am honest review. I read All the Missing Girls first thinking it was the first in a series. Wrong. Two stand alone books. I loved All the Missing Girls. The reverse plot was wonderfully suspenseful and creative. So, back to this review. I was disappointed in the plot that was convoluted and at times a confusing read. The character development was not strong enough to pull me through the pages and I felt the ending was forced. I will stick with the author and continue to read and recommend her books.

I just loved this book! It's very well plotted and intriguing. It is written from an interesting concept, in reverse chronological order - just like her previous book ' All the Missing Girls'.
The main character, Leah is endearing in that she's very humaine and real. Her only fault was being ambitious, but also too trusting and having her own problems. The book is well written. The language is clear and convincing. You can relate to the main character and you move along in the flow of the story.
There were enough suspense to keep the book afloat and bravo for the ending! I did not see that coming!
I would highly recommend this book! Definitely 5 stars. Thank you to the author, Megan Miranda and the publisher, Simon & Schuster, and not forgetting Nicole McArdle for letting me read this book in advance.

I enjoyed All The Missing Girls and was looking forward to reading this book as well. I enjoyed the other book better. This book seemed to be trying too hard to be twisty and surprising and it kind of lost me. I'm surprised by all the 4+ star reviews. I actually went away on vacation for a week and didn't pick the book up once.

Leah Stevens and her friend Emmy move from Boston to Pennsylvania in order to start fresh. They were formerly friends in college who reconnected and both need a new start. Leah is a journalist who is trying to get away from her former life, and Emmy is getting out of a rough relationship. They aren't in Pennsylvania for very long before a girl who resembles Leah turns up beaten close to their home, and Emmy disappears shortly thereafter. When Leah reports Emmy missing she begins to realize that she never really knew Emmy at all and isn't even sure that's her real name. She begins to piece together what happened to the beaten girl and sees that she may be involved in something when she had no idea.

I'm tired just writing the summary of the story. It seemed all over the place for me and really lost my interest. I didn't even cover the dead body that was found in the lake or Leah's nosy students who try to be mysterious but can't really pull it off. This book just didn't do it for me.

The Perfect Stranger is a psychological thriller that will keep you guessing! I loved the plot and the storyline was really well developed. The only reason I didn't give this 5 stars was because I was really hoping for the ending I kept thinking was coming! I'm not going to give any spoilers, but the way it ends up is satisfying. It's just not as much of a twist as I wanted. The characters in the book are great. I especially love the way some of the characters become stronger and more complex during the book. If you love thrillers, you need to read this! I'm looking forward to seeing what other people think of the ending.

I can’t wait to start The Perfect Stranger by Megan Miranda. I devoured her first novel, All The Missing Girls, and have a feeling I will zip through this one too. Here’s the premise:

Confronted by a restraining order and the threat of a lawsuit, failed journalist Leah Stevens needs to get out of Boston when she runs into an old friend, Emmy Grey, who has just left a troubled relationship. Emmy proposes they move to rural Pennsylvania, where Leah can get a teaching position and both women can start again. But their new start is threatened when a woman with an eerie resemblance to Leah is assaulted by the lake, and Emmy disappears days later.

Determined to find Emmy, Leah cooperates with Kyle Donovan, a handsome young police officer on the case. As they investigate her friend’s life for clues, Leah begins to wonder: did she ever really know Emmy at all? With no friends, family, or a digital footprint, the police begin to suspect that there is no Emmy Grey. Soon Leah’s credibility is at stake, and she is forced to revisit her past: the article that ruined her career. To save herself, Leah must uncover the truth about Emmy Grey—and along the way, confront her old demons, find out who she can really trust, and clear her own name.

Everyone in this rural Pennsylvanian town has something to hide—including Leah herself. How do you uncover the truth when you are busy hiding your own?

I won't put the story in my own words but will tell how it affected me. This was the first book I have read by Megan and very much was able to set the scenes in my mind with her descriptions without being overly wordy. The book kept my interest from beginning to end. I liked that it was written from Leah and she was telling the story. I felt as if I was riding on her shoulder throughout and there were times I wanted to scream out 'don't do that' of 'get away from there'. I felt as if she and I were in the middle of a sailor know trying to work our way out and every time one side of the knot loosened the other side tightened up. When I finished the book I sat and thought about it for awhile thinking about the ending and what might of happened. At first I was a bit upset that it was somewhat open ended but after thought, liked they way it was.
Thank you for allowing me to read on NetGalley.

Megan Miranda’s The Perfect Stranger is billed as being a sequel to her highly successful All The Missing Girls – although as far as I can tell, there are no common characters or plot threads, unless one counts the fact that one of the characters in The Perfect Stranger is a “missing girl”! So if, like me, you haven’t read the earlier book, you won’t have any problems getting into this one, as it’s a standalone, and is a thoroughly enjoyable and intriguing read that asks some interesting questions. How well we can ever know another person? How honest and accurate are our self-perceptions? Just how far would you go for a friend who’d done a lot for you?

Leah Stevens worked as a journalist in Boston until a story blew up in her face. She had been investigating the deaths – seemingly suicides - of four young college students which she was convinced were murders, but when she refused to reveal a key source, she was slapped with a restraining order and the paper threatened with a lawsuit. Betrayed – it was her boyfriend who tipped off their editor – with no job and nowhere to go, Leah is relieved when she runs into Emmy Grey, someone she’d lived with shortly after leaving college some eight years ago.

Over several drinks at Emmy’s place, Leah gathers that her friend has just come out of a bad relationship and is keen to get out of Boston, too, so they stick a pin in a map and settle on Western Pennsylvania as the place they can both make a fresh start. Leah gets a job as a school teacher (and I have to say, the author’s comments about various aspects of the profession struck a real chord with me!) while Emmy drifts about, cleaning houses, working at a local motel… and because their schedules are so different, with Emmy often coming home as Leah is going out, they rarely see each other. Even so, however, Leah gets the impression that all is not well with her friend; she’s tense and on edge and it’s like she’s waiting for the other shoe to drop.

Because their schedules are so different, it takes Leah a few days to realise that Emmy hasn’t been home for some time. The post-it notes stuck on the wall reminding her the rent is due and various phone messages from Emmy’s boyfriend have fallen down rather than been removed, and Leah begins to worry for her friend’s safety. But if she files a missing persons’ report, it will lead to questions about Leah’s own situation, and those are questions she is not willing to answer. When a young woman who bears a striking resemblance to her is attacked on the other side of the lake from where Leah lives and a fellow member of staff at the school is the prime suspect, she is forced to accept that she can no longer distance herself and fly under the radar if she is to find out what happened to her friend.

Leah opens up to Kyle Donovan, the handsome young detective assigned to the assault case, telling him about Emmy and her fear that something has happened to her. But as the investigation proceeds it becomes apparent that even though Leah had believed herself to be very close to Emmy, she really didn’t know her at all, and worse, the police are starting to believe that she doesn’t actually exist. Leah knows that once her past is revealed, and it’s known that she is suspected of having invented a source, that belief is only going to be reinforced; yet Leah can’t give up. She’s got to prove that Emmy is real and then find out what has happened to her in order to prove her credibility and clear her own name. And in doing so, she starts to question her own long-held certainties about herself, her drive to seek the truth, her belief in her ability to read people and get them to open up to her… and to realise that she has been a victim of her own hubris.

Megan Miranda does a terrific job in this book of creating and maintaining an atmosphere of menace and uncertainty. She skilfully drip-feeds the truth about Leah’s situation, hinting at what she’s running from and slowly fitting the pieces of the puzzle together – although it’s not until well into the story that we finally discover the nature of the terrifying events that set her on the path she’s now travelling. And there’s also the fact that Leah is somewhat of an unreliable narrator, something the author plays with so cleverly that there are times the reader even questions the fact of Emmy’s existence, wondering if the police are right and she’s just a figment of Leah’s obviously active imagination.

On the negative side, however, there are times when there is perhaps just a little too much going on, there are a few plot-threads that are not suitably resolved, and a couple of large inconsistencies that really had me scratching my head – and not in a good way. The mystery is full of satisfying twists and turns, with a few suitably gobsmacking moments of realisation along the way, but the ending is somewhat anticlimactic. Things end well for Leah and Kyle, but it’s all a little low-key, so while I was pleased that everything was nicely tied up, I’d expected something a little… well, more.

With all that said, however, I enjoyed The Perfect Stranger enough to recommend it to fans of strongly written, atmospheric mysteries. It caught my interest early and kept me turning the pages, so I’m definitely interested in reading more by this author.

reviewed by AAR's Caz

The first thing my mother said was: “I don’t remember any Emmy.” As if this were the most important fact.


Leah Stevens was a journalist, but she pushed too hard for the truth that ended in tragedy, one that made her suspect. Filled with shame, guilt and failure she flees Boston, bumping into her old college friend Emmy Grey who is escaping her own personal disaster (a rotten relationship). The answer is to head to Pennsylvania together for a fresh start, a much more quiet setting where Leah can take up teaching. Naturally, her mother sees this as a huge step backwards in her road to success. Why teaching? Why there? Lurking through the story is an incident that led Leah to her current hiding place, hiding from life, memories, her future. Then a woman is attacked, one who resembles her roommate Emmy- when Emmy fails to come home, Leah knows something is dreadfully wrong. Terrified for herself and desperate to find her friend before it’s too late, she begins to uncover the mystery.

In walks Kyle Donovan, a police officer working the case as it grows stranger still. Emmy hasn’t just gone missing, she has disappeared into thin air, as if she never existed at all. Leah begins to doubt Emmy was ever real, pushing her to confront someone from her past, someone she is better off staying away from. Has she lost her mind? Is Emmy someone she conjured into existence? How can someone vanish so completely that they leave no crumbs behind? There aren’t even pictures! Maybe Leah has lost her mind! We don’t know anymore than she does. The reader comes to doubt her recollections. Just what did she do in the past, was she wrong? Is she a liar? Just who is the victim? Is someone after her?There has to be a truth to dig up, someone must have seen something? As she pieces her life together, and dissects her time with Emmy she begins to realize things are not solid, that she is to blame but why?

I thought this story was going somewhere else, so it was a nice surprise I guessed wrong. I was tricked, which I like in a mystery/thriller because I hate when I guess everything straight off. I doubted the ending, thinking most of us would react differently. As Leah’s past surfaced, I didn’t trust her nor the way she couldn’t remember straight- I think this is the best part of the novel- that self-doubting demon in all of us. The fear we have betrayed ourselves, either by confusion or delusions. What can we do when no one can back up our truth? Confirm what is real?

This was good, there are some strange characters even at her school. I kept thinking I knew what happened and pegging ‘who done it’ but nope. In All The Missing Girls, I didn’t guess what was going on either so I have to give Megan Miranda credit, it isn’t easy to mislead most avid readers. What bigger stranger exists than ourselves?

Publication Date: May 16, 2017

Simon & Schuster

There's just something about Megan Miranda's writing that suits me perfectly. This is the second book of hers that I've read and thought it was outstanding. I've heard people compare her to Gillian Flynn but I actually think her books are more suspenseful. This book leaves you questioning "fate" when just the right person shows up out of the blue. READ IT NOW!