Wow. Wow. Wow. This is a compelling page-turner that would not let me go. This book did not have to look for me. I was glued to it and finished in one day -- sneaking chapters in around the rest of the tasks needing my attention. Molly Clarke is missing. Did she walk away? Who could blame her? The trauma her family experienced when Molly accidentally struck the youngest child with her car has resulted in walls obstructing the relationships between husband and wife; mother and child. Molly's daughter does not give up and it is heartwarming to watch Nicole push and push to get to the bottom of the mystery. Filled with thrilling moments of peril, some convincing red herrings, and a well-timed plot twist here and there; this is one of my favorite reads of 2020.

Thank you to St. Martins Press and NetGalley for a DRC in exchange for a honest review.

// 𝐁𝐎𝐎𝐊 / 𝐑𝐄𝐕𝐈𝐄𝗪 //⁣⁣⁣⁣⁣
⁣⁣⁣⁣⁣
Title: #DontLookForMe
Author: @wendywalkerauthor
Publisher:@stmartinspress
Pub Date: 9/15/2020⁣
Type: #Hardcover #FinishedCopy
Total Pages: 352
Genre: #Mystery #Thriller⁣
Must Read Rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐⁣⁣⁣⁣💫

My thoughts:

I often wonder how authors come up with the ideas/plots behind their books. I can honestly say, I have never read ANYTHING quite like Don't Look For Me and I am desperate to uncover how and why Wendy came up with this book idea! It was brilliantly written and for the life of me, I could not put it down. There are a lot of mystery/thriller novels out in the market today that lack originality or punch and this was NOT ONE OF THEM! I am astonished that Walker can continue to write such amazing and unique stories. Her writing style is no like other and I know I am in for a treat when I open her books. This book packs a doozy .... full of lots of (un)likeable characters and the perfect amount of suspense to keep you fully engaged. I went into this one without any knowledge of what the book was actually about and I would highly suggest that my followers do the same. This will likely rank as one of my top thrillers of 2020 ... and I definitely encourage you to grab this as soon as it publishes! Bravo, Wendy!

If all you need from a book is a propulsive, creepy-in-a-good-but-not-supernatural-way thriller, you will be highly satisfied with Don't Look for Me. If you want even more -- say. a richly complex family dynamic under the microscope of tragedy and press coverage, there will still be lasting satisfaction from this book.

And if, finally, you demand from your reading an intelligent narrative that treats all characters and the reader with respect, this could be your new favorite book. It scored on all levels, particularly the complicated interaction between mothers and daughters -- in this case Molly and Nicole, a mother who has disappeared and the almost-estranged daughter who relentlessly searches for her.

I am late to the Wendy Walker fan club, but I will be making up for lost time. Thanks to NetGalley and St. Martin's Press for an advance readers copy.

Excellent psychological suspense! Well drawn characters, edge of your seat plot combine to make this a must read!

This is a story about fortitude and healing, about finding the strength to perform the basic acts that keep us going and sustain life. This involves facing those demons who want to do nothing but hold us back from what they know is salvation, a place down a road they tell you is impassible. While it may be covered with brambles and thorns, one can still pass through if the will to do so is strong enough. This involves recognizing what is most important.

Molly Clarke is in this dark place, trapped in a mental prison of her own making, reinforced by her beliefs. A traumatic event has caused her family to split and when Molly leaves a note and disappears, her family believes she is gone for good.

Except for her daughter, Nicole. Nic has her own demons, ones she cannot exorcise without finding the truth. Nic returns to the small town where her mother disappeared, doing her best to reopen the investigation that was essentially closed. The more Nic discovers, the more she feels that people are lying to her and the truth becomes difficult to separate from the fiction.

Author Wendy Walker starts the suspense right from Chapter One and keeps it rolling throughout the book. I thought that early on I had deciphered the clues and solved the mystery only to discover that Ms. Walker had planted a few red herrings for readers to find. The result was a satisfying read that I raced through in a few readings. Four stars.

My thanks to NetGalley and St. Martin’s Press for a complimentary electronic copy of this title.

This was a great suspense read! Lots of twists and action. Thoroughly enjoyed and quickly read! I will definitely be reading others by this author!

This is my first book by Wendy Walker. I have definitely found a new author that I want to read more of!!! This book is filled with suspense. I didn't want to put it down. Molly Walker has had some bad things happen in her life. Her family is growing apart and she's feeling a lot of guilt over something that happened with her daughter. I don't want to give away the story, but if you like mystery and suspense, you will really enjoy this book! The story is told in two perspectives, and jumps back and forth between timelines for the first half, and then both people are in the same time frame. I really enjoyed this book. The characters are all flawed, but I found myself rooting for them. Well worth reading!!

I was definitely caught by surprise by who the villains were and I think you will be too. The story is eerie and filled with suspense. When Molly disappears, her daughter Nicole goes searching for her. It is a twisted plot told from several point of views that retraces the steps that brings the characters to this point in time. The author does an especially great job with Alice’s character which makes her seem almost surreal.

Molly Clarke has been a mere shell of herself since her car struck and killed her 9-year-old daughter Annie five years ago. The incident was an unavoidable accident but Molly can't forgive herself and - in her profound grief - has become distanced from her husband John, teenage son Ethan, and 21-year-old daughter Nicole (Nic).

Nic, who was babysitting Annie at the time, also feels guilty, and fills up her 'hollow spaces' with vodka and one-night-stands.

Molly still makes it her business to make the four hour drive to her son's boarding school every other Thursday, to watch his football games. As Molly is returning home one evening, a storm hits and her car runs out of gas. Being just outside Hastings, Connecticut, Molly gets out to seek help, hails a passing truck, and vanishes.

When Molly's car is found, her family descends on Hastings, but the police can't find a clue to Molly's whereabouts. Two days later a note signed by Molly is found in a hotel room, asking her family not to look for her.

Molly's family won't give up that easily and offers a big reward for information about her whereabouts. Two weeks later, while Molly's husband is away on business, a woman comes forward with information and Nic returns to Hastings to check it out.

The book is told from the alternating perspectives of Molly and Nic. Molly's sections provide a day by day precis of what she's experiencing; and Nic's segments detail her search for her mother and her interactions with people in Hastings, especially the sheriff; deputy sheriff; hotel manager; and bartender.

The tension builds up little by little as we learn of Molly's plight and observe the suspicious behavior of people in Hastings.

That's all I can say without spoilers.

The book is suspenseful but moves too slowly for my taste. I don't enjoy books that are (mostly) step by step descriptions of what people are doing. I also got tired of seeing the phrase 'hollow spaces', which is used again and again to describe Nic's state of mind. Moreover the story's climax is overwritten and has elements that are not believable. That said, many readers loved the book so you might want to check it out for yourself.

Thanks to Netgalley, the author (Wendy Walker), and the publisher (St.Martin's Press) for a copy of the book.

Wendy Walker has done it again. Yet another edge of your seat thriller. And you will not know who the real criminal is until the very end. It is that good !!! Molly Clarke disappears, did she leave on her own ? Or was she taken ? The Clarke's lives are falling apart. Is it all related to a girl who went missing years earlier ? Or a completely separate crime. Fast read and hard to put down. Excellent as always.

Don't Look for Me by Wendy Walker is a superb page turner. Well worth the time and the read! Looking forward to the next novel.

Wendy Walker's Don't Look for Me is a book that broke my heart, kept my pulse pounding, and literally made me gasp out loud; it doesn't get much better than that!!!

Realistic, flawed characters, a tight plot, escalating suspense and a cheer them on story will keep readers engaged from the first page to the last. Kudos on another good read, Wendy!!! Keep them coming!!!

My thanks to NetGalley and St. Martin's Press for allowing me to read a copy of this book in exchange for an unbiased review. All opinions stated here are indeed my own.

One night, Molly Clarke walked away from her life. She doesn’t want to be found. Or at least, that’s the story.

I have been needing a good thriller in my life that I couldn’t put down and this was it. I started it Saturday morning and finished it Saturday night. About 15% of the way in I thought that I figured out how the story was going to pan out, but boy was I wrong. The author did such a phenomenal job by leaving us hanging at the end of each chapter so that it’s impossible to put down.

This book will be our on September 15th and I highly recommend getting it! Thank you @stmartinspress and @netgalley for an advance copy in exchange for my honest review.

Wow! This book kept me on the edge of my seat. I didn't want to stop reading. There were twists and turns; some I saw coming and some I didn't. With the backstory of Molly you could see how people would think she could just walk away from her family, but the daughter, Nic, knew she could not. Nic would not give up looking for her mom. The mother and the daughter's characters are really explored; not so much for the dad and the son. Would have liked a little more interaction with the dad but in spite of that I thoroughly enjoyed this book. I read it in 2 days.

I received this book from NetGalley. I have read quite a few of Wendy Walker’s books so I was excited to get this one early.

Molly Clarke has had a hard go in life lately, her family relationships were strained and she isn’t happy. When she disappears, it is easy to imagine she could have walked away from it all. However, her daughter knows that something isn’t right with the official story.

Walker wrote a compelling story that kept me wanting to turn the page. As for the twists, some I saw coming and some I didn’t. I felt like some of the more peripheral characters, like Molly’s son and husband were a bit under developed, but that was probably necessary to keep the main story moving.

For fans of Wendy Walker or fans of “there’s a twist” trillers, this book won’t disappoint.

THIS BOOK WAS AMAZING!! I was pulled in from the start and finished within a day. The different POV between mother and daughter felt so real. The twists were so well done! I didn’t know who to trust. Thank you so much for this one!

Thank you NetGalley for the opportunity to read this book as an ARC in return for a honest review. I read this book in less than 2 days. It was truly a griping thriller and mystery. The premise of a woman with a horrible past leaving home and never coming back. Molly Clarke accidentally killed her nine year old daughter five years prior. Her daughter ran into the street just as Molly was rushing home from work concerned as she could not reach her three children. Her oldest daughter Nicole was supposed to be taking care of them and did not answer her calls. What a sad sad story and then the aftermath of what followed. Molly and her husband became distant, Nicole, who was a star student started engaging in risky behaviors and was expelled from school, and her teenage son was a star athlete at a boarding school. Molly drove every other week to the boarding school, four hours each way, to see Evan play. But this last time Evan was embarassed that she was there and avoided her. When Molly left to drive home she ran out of gas, during a awful storm, and that is where the story truly takes off. Molly is picked up by a stranger and a little girl, the same age as her daughter Annie who died. Her family is looking for her but clues make it appear as if she left on her own accord. Her daughter Nicole (Nic) is persistent though and keeps looking for her mother in the strange town of Hastings with strange characters. The characters are all suspect and you really don't know who is telling the truth or not. The book kept you guessing to the end. I truly enjoyed the ride and this novel. I will not say more as do not want to give anything away. Great book! Thank you again for the opportunity to read and review.

What a ride. Molly Clark trying to hang on to her life finds herself alone on a road seemingly deserted until a strange offers a ride. Here her life changes in drastic ways. Captive she runs through the psychological turmoil of all prisoners. Time is not her friend and as time goes on she mentally is sure she isn’t missed and or loved by her family. Her daughter on a tip is looking and found the attention of Molly’s captors. This pushes all the buttons , a trait I see is the hallmark of this author. If you are a fan ,happy days. If you are new to the fold welcome. Happy reading

I love mysteries and always enjoy missing persons ones so I was excited about this novel from the description but I’m sorry to say it was a chore to get through. The story is told in alternating chapters between the mother Molly and her daughter Nic.
There is a sad family tragedy that haunts the family and is the reason it’s easy for some to believe that Molly just walked away. While the description sets up a mystery as to what really happened to Molly in reality the reader very quickly learns the truth so that part is not the mystery of the story. Unfortunately the characters are very thin and have an annoying habit of going over their woes and issues over and over which I found grating. Like Nic drinks too much and has meaningless sex because of the family tragedy which she cannot get past and the reader has to keep hearing about. At first I liked Nic’s chapters a lot more but her constant stagnation got old real quick. The tragedy is awful and brutally sad and quite hard to keep hearing about so this novel is quiet dark and sad. There are a lot of secondary characters that also have no substance and just seem like bad small town stereotypes. I regret ever bothering with this novel so I would recommend that you skip it. I received a complimentary copy of this book. Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own.

This book really fooled me. I was so cocky and confident that I had guessed the ending about half way through, that I already had an idea of what I was going to rate it and say in my review, but then WHAM~ I was knocked off my smug little perch. Isn't that awesome!?
There is nothing better than having an author take you on a ride and deposit you at the end satisfied and smiling.
Read it if you get the chance, you won't be disappointed!