A gripping tale of deception, murder and suspense that will keep you chasing pages. The chilling story unfolds in a manner that will hold your imagination and stop you sleeping at night

character. There are suddenly a ton of "female FBI agent with a tragic unsolved past" books, but this one had a good storyline. However the fiance part was weird and terrible - he was obviously not a good fit and it was going to end so I don't know why it needed to exist.
The narrator was good as well- clear and easy to understand. However she kept pronouncing some words strangely : "college" with very hard enunciated consonants, "Louisville" as looey- ville instead of loo-ah-ville as it is pronounced by anyone familiar with it. Nothing terrible, but enough to take me out of the story.
Overall I enjoyed the book and woild continue the series

Thank you to NetGalley and the author for my advance copy of this audiobook

This one was okay. I wanted to love it, but it unfortunately wasn't for me. I would still recommend to others.

My rating guide:
1- Hated it, don't read this
2- Not for me, you might like it
3- Very good! Add to your long list
4- Loved it, you need to read
5- NEW FAVORITE!!! READ IT NOW!

This was a great read and I was hooked from the jump! This was my 1st book by Dana Perry, but will not be my last! I am adding all of her books to my TBR and I now have a new series to add to my ever-expanding list of series I love!

#TheNowhereGirls
#NetGalley

Thank you NetGalley and publisher for this audio!

This was my first book by this author. I wasn’t sure what to expect but wow!! That plot twist was not what I was expecting lol it was so good!! Very well written.

If murder mysteries are your thing then you will live this book!! An FBI agent takes on the case of finally solving her little sisters murder and so many more things happen along the way. I loved it!!

This was good and I definitely look forward to the story continuing in the next book. It was a bit predictable though

Thank you to NetGalley and Dreamscape Select for giving me the opportunity to listen to this audiobook.
I will start by saying I was intrigued by the premise…a woman whose sister was murdered 15 years prior is now an FBI agent and has believed her sister’s killer has been behind bars for 15 years. Now another girl goes missing in her small home town. The storyline was good, however, I thought the writing was repetitive and very simple. In addition, the narrator was not good to my ear. I was distracted by her over annunciation throughout, her lack of feeling in the reading, and her mispronunciation of words. This was not for me.

Narrated by Madeline Pell ⭐⭐⭐
I didn't love this narrator. I found her voice and the way she told the story quite annoying after awhile.
by Dana Perry ⭐⭐⭐

The premise of this story is dark and brutal. Definitely had me bringe listening needing to know how, who, why!

The only negative thing I have to say is I did find that either the author's writing is a lite juvenile or the narrator was a little over the top making the writing seem juvenile.

Definitely a series I want to continue though.

This is my first exposure to this author and I was not disappointed. Perry has delivered a fast paced and deliciously wicked tale. The characters are well rounded and come across as believable, whether you love them or hate them. This provocative, somewhat dark and twisted story grabs you from the first page and keeps you guessing until the very end where the authors insert a deliciously wicked twist.

Thank you to NetGalley and Bookouture who provided me with a copy of this book. I am voluntarily leaving an honest review.

Huntsdale! Huntsdale! Huntsdale!

Nikki Case is an FBI agent who has found social media fame after she solved the case of a missing girl. Now, she is being brought back to her hometown (you guessed it, Huntsdale) when the man convicted of murdering her sister 15yrs ago, has finally agreed to open up about the crime that devastated her family. Not only did she lose her sister that tragic day but her dad was a casualty too. He was the town sheriff, tasked with investigating the murder of his own daughter, and the stress caused him to die of a massive heart attack. These two terrible events shaped Nikki's life forever. That's why she jumps into a new investigation when another young girl goes missing, in her home town, with startling resemblance to her sister's murder. Can Nikki bring this new victim home and uncover the secrets of her sister's death that have long been buried?

The premise of this book was very appealing to me and could have worked, but for me it was a huge miss. I love a strong female lead but found Nikki to be grating. She was insubordinate, shallow (glad you didn't gain 50 pounds), self absorbed and reckless. I have no clue why she was with her fiancé beside him being rich and good looking, because they were clearly miles apart. They would be talking about her dead sister and he wants to start hooking up...weird. The other characters are fairly flat. The story is told from Nikki's POV.

I absolutely despised the writing. First off, did the author receive a kickback every time she used the word Huntsdale? It is used hundreds of times at nauseum. The author's style seems to be repeating every fact or name of a character over and over and over. Missed a detail? Don't fret it will be said a dozen more times before the end of the chapter. I considered making Huntsdale a drinking game but by the end of the book I would be in rehab. Speaking of, if you are going to use a name a million times, shouldn't it at least be correct in the book's official description? It reads Groveton.

Possible Spoilers:
The plot is weakened with too many character stereotypes (fat small time sheriff hates big bad FBI woman) and plot leaps (cases have to be linked because of a date and a rose). Did no one question why she believed the convicted murder who wants to clear up the true story but tells her nothing? There were a lot of inconsistencies in the story. For example, she would say that in a small town no one wants to talk to the FBI agent they don't know and then immediately that person would know who Nikki was and her whole backstory talking directly to her. The ending was okay with a couple minor twists.

I waited a couple of days to write a review but the more I thought about it the more I disliked.

I had the audio version read by Madeline Pell. I did not enjoy her reading. She over enunciates and has little character changes in her voice.

Thank you to Netgalley and Bookouture for an audio copy in exchange for an honest review.

Holy cow that was good! I am new to Dana Perry and didn't realize what I was getting into, but I am really glad I did. Talk about not expecting who the villain is. I had no idea until the chapter before the reveal. I love when that happens. Great characters, great plot and really great suspense. Now, I'm off to read the next one!

I could not stop listening to this book! The Greg plot could've been left out, because he was kind of irrelevant in my opinion. It also bothered me a little how last names were used a LOT. Besides those things, this was a page turner that I did not want to stop listening to. Such a good story. Thanks NetGalley and Dreamscape Select for this free audio book ARC in exchange for my honest review!

The premise of this book had me intrigued from the start.
FBI agent Nikki Cassidy travels back to her hometown to speak to the man serving a life sentence for murdering her 12 yr old sister. After 15 years of not speaking to her during her annual visits, he is finally ready to talk and he is claiming he didn’t do it. While in town, another girl goes missing and Nikki can’t help but feel this case is connected to her sister’s case. Full of rich characters and twist and turns, this psychological thriller is perfect for fans of Karin Slaughter and Mary Kubica.

I feel like I've read this story before, or something similar. It seems like a predictable storyline where the main character gets into their line of work because of what happened to her sister as a child. Her sister's case is reignited and goes home again to where it all began, to investigate. It just wasn't quite unique enough to keep me interested.

Thank you to Netgalley, Dreamscape Select and Dana Perry for this ALC.

Nikki is an FBI agent working in the crimes against children unit. Her family was forever changed when her sister was kidnapped and brutally murdered and she lives with the guilt that her mother puts directly on her. Every year on the anniversary of her sisters kidnapping, she goes to visit the man convicted to get some answers. He stares at her and says nothing. When she is contacted and told that he finally wants to speak with her she id shocked by his words. The story is dark, twisted, creepy, scary and is more that anyone in law enforcement could have anticipated. The road to getting resolutions about what happened to her sister, her father, unearthing corruption within law enforcement, finding the latest kidnap victim, trying to make peace with her mother and a whole lot of deceit, deception, death and truly awful things was well crafted and interesting. Nikki Cassidy is smart, savvy, driven and I anxiously await the next in the series to see what is next for her. A disturbing, but good listen.

🎧THE NOWHERE GIRLS by Dana Perry is narrated by Madeline Pell and out April 2nd.

This is a story that introduces FBI agent Nikki Cassidy who is haunted by the kidnapping and killing of her younger sister years ago. When another 12-year-old girl goes missing in the same community, Nikki is determined to find out what the truth really is about this case and her sister's.

First, I really thought this was a strong premise and the plot felt solid. Dark and seedy, this series may be a good one with tough child-related crimes finding justice.

Unfortunately, I had an incredible difficulty with this narrator. I don't know if the written version read as simple and choppy, but it felt like that was how it was read to me. Over-enunciation, and little to no voice changes for characters or emotion left me struggling to engage in the story.

I do think the story may have merit, and if it sounds like a possible win, I would give the written version a try!

Thank you to @bookouture & @netgalley for sharing this title with me.

It's the fifteenth anniversary of her younger sisters murder & Nikki Cassidy, now an agent with the FBI, has returned to her small hometown, only to find out that another young girl has just been taken. But with her sister's killer behind bars, are the parallels to her sister’s case just a coincidence, or is something more sinister at work?

Loved the premise, thought the execution could have been a little better. Very twisty & kept me engaged though. Narrator was awesome!!

I listened to the audiobook and I really enjoyed. I have to say there were characters that annoyed me and sometimes I wanted to tell Agent Cassidy to wake up and smell the coffee. 😂

But all in all a good start to a new series. I’ll be listening to the other 2 soon.

On the fifteenth anniversary of the murder of her younger sister Caitlin, Nikki Cassidy, now an agent with the FBI, returns to her small Ohio hometown, only to find out that another young girl has just been taken. But with Caitlin’s killer behind bars, are the parallels to her sister’s case just a coincidence, or is something more sinister at work?

With such a promising premise, I am actually shocked at how average this book managed to be. Seeing it was the first in a series featuring FBI agent Nikki Cassidy, I had high hopes for it, but I figured out pretty quickly that I was in for a major disappointment.

Part of this might be due to the absolutely false book description. From the name of Nikki‘s hometown (Huntsdale, not Groveton), to the fact that the body found in the woods does *not* belong to Natalie Jarvis, and that there is no note addressed to Nikki next to it, it almost seems like I read a completely different book. Furthermore, while the book‘s title is amazing, there actually already exist not one but two books by that same name (one was written by Amy Reed, one by Alex Urquhart, and both were published in 2017), which probably could have been avoided.

As for the actual content of the book, I found it to be slightly below your average mystery/suspense.

My main gripe with the book is that it seems to assume its readers are either of below average intelligence or have the attention span of a three-year old, judging by the repetitiveness of the writing. First, every single detail of the case is repeated seemingly at least once in every chapter for the first half of the book, mostly under the guise of Nikki talking to a new person. To make matters worse, anytime someone on the periphery of the story is mentioned, we are repeatedly reintroduced to them: not only are we reminded of their full names (yes, again and again), but most often also to their occupation, lest we ever forget that, for example, „Tommy Thompson“ (yes, that‘s his name, though I‘m not sure about the spelling since I listened to the audiobook) is actually „District Attorney Thommy Thompson“. If your reader still needs to be reminded the third or tenth time a name is mentioned, they are probably the wrong audience for a mystery novel. Not only does this repetitiveness take away from the suspense, it also gets irritating quickly.

As for Nikki herself, while I appreciated that she is unapologetically career-driven, she is actually not that great at her job, but comes across as insubordinate and gullible; for all her pride in her ability to read people, she gets it wrong all the time, which does not humble her one bit. Not surprisingly (but annoyingly), she frequently goes off on her own to follow leads, and even hijacks a press conference by giving away all all the details of her case when you‘d think playing your cards close to the vest is investigation 101. It‘s not even clear why she even needs other agents there with her (one serves to give her relationship advice, while the other is mostly comic relief), as none of them actually really do anything of substance for most of the book.

The underlying mystery itself sounded far more interesting in the somewhat misleading description than it played out to be in the actual book. To be fair, that also might have at least a little to do with the questionable investigative tactics displayed. Conflicts of interest aside, it feels like none of these supposedly highly trained agents know how to behave during an investigation (for example, while securing a potential crime scene - unmistakable, complete with open door and blood on the floor - they amicably chitchat with each other, all while the culprit might still be on the scene and they‘re supposed to secure the perimeter). But on the other hand, there isn‘t exactly a criminal mastermind at work, either, so maybe it evens itself out? (Who goes through the trouble of setting up a website on the dark web only to choose a password as simple as a name? Not even Google would allow that these days!)

Finally, there is a completely unnecessary romance angle that takes up way too much space, though Nikki‘s fiancé is as dull as dishwater, insensitive (trying to get into her pants right after she talks about her dead sister), and beyond misogynistic. In fact, Nicki herself isn‘t even sure she loves him, and he adds nothing to the story. I actually found myself secretly hoping he was the killer just so she could shoot him in the end.

Tl;dr: a promising premise with a disappointing execution.

Thank you to NetGalley and Dreamscape Select for the ARC in exchange for my honest review.