I love the Frankie Elkin series, but this one was my least favorite. It was a complicated story that was well researched and centered around the plight of Afghan refugees. It alternated between 2 timelines, however it was a slow read for me. There were a lot of characters and I loved Darryl, Genni, Bart and the pets. I did like the ending. It wasn't what I expected. The very, very end was also intriguing and I can't wait to see what Frankie does next.

I rated this book 3 stars. I enjoy Lisa Jackson's writing style, and I'm a big fan of the true crime genre. However, I wish I had preface this book by reading the other's that came before it, in order to be more familiar with the characters. I think it would have made it more enjoyable. Over all a good audio book though!

Frankie Elkin #4. I've loved Lisa Gardner's Frankie Elkin series from the beginning, and book #4 did not disappoint. This book was compelling!

In Kiss Her Goodbye, Frankie Elkin is in Tuscon, Arizona, searching for an Afghan refugee who disappeared and left her 3-year-old daughter behind. No one in law enforcement seems too concerned about the missing refugee woman, so the woman's friend reaches out to Frankie for help.

The author, Lisa Gardner, did a very good job of creating a solid mystery around the Afghan refugee system. Kiss Her Goodbye is such an interesting, eye-opening, and impactful read!

The story is very cleverly written and is full of great twists and turns. The mystery and backstory are, understandably, emotionally deep, but the side characters, along with Frankie's living arrangements, offer a levity and good balance to the story. This book is a little slower paced than some of the other books in the Frankie Elkin series, but it didn't take away from my enjoyment of the book.

Kiss Her Goodbye is worth reading! (And, be sure to take the time to read the author's notes at the end of the book.) This book can be read as a standalone. If you are interested in a great series, though, I highly recommend reading the whole Frankie Elkin series. 

Thank you, NetGalley and Grand Central Publishing, for providing me a review copy of this book. I'm looking forward to Frankie Elkin #5!

This is the fourth book in the Frankie Elkin series. I have only read one other book in the series, and this would be easy to read as a standalone book. Although I really enjoy this series and plan on reading the books that I have missed.

Frankie’s unofficial job is to find people who no one else is looking for. She never knows where a case will take her or who she’ll be looking for she just knows that people need her and this is what she must do. It’s not a job that pays, it is just something that Frankie needs to do.

Frankie is tasked with finding Sabera, a recent Afghan refugee who has gone missing. No one even seems to be looking for her, but her friend knows that Sabera would not leave her daughter behind. This case is way more complicated than Frankie could ever imagine it to be, there is many twists that were so well written and even some very enjoyable funny parts as well.

I really enjoy the way this author writes and have enjoyed every book of hers I’ve ever read I look forward to many more books in the Frankie Elkin series.

Thank you to NetGalley, the publishing house and the author for the opportunity to read a complimentary copy of this book in return for a review, based upon my honest opinion

Normally a huge Lisa Gardner fan and her books are usually a 5 star read for me. Didn't love this one as much as I thought I would. I found the mystery to be slow and the plot confusing.

I almost DNR for 2 reasons. It was mid series - and often it's just too hard to catch up. Second was the subject matter. This war in particular is just hard

But I read it and totally enjoyed. Was able to figure Frankie out and bonded over her fear of reptiles -yuk! Did not have trouble "catching up" - totally readable as a stand alone.

The war parts were hard to read - but an interagal part of the story. Handled as well as the subject could be. Loved all the main characters.

Great book - may have to read the rest of the series!

This is the first book in this series I've read and while there are references to events from prior books, this can be read as a stand alone. Frankie doesn't have a job or home, but she does specialize in finding cold case missing persons. Her latest case has taken her to Tucson, AZ to search for a missing Afghan refugee.

This story is told from two perspectives. The first is in the present with Frankie trying to piece together why Sabera has disappeared. This is made more difficult due to privacy concerns for those charged with helping the refugees and the distrust of the Afghan refugees. The other part of the story reveals what happened in her life in Afghanistan and the migrant camp.

As the story progresses, it becomes clear there is more going on than meets the eye. Challenges faced by refugees is brought to light. And Frankie finds herself in a odd situation with her house/pet sitting arrangement. The closer Frankie gets to finding answers regarding Sabera's disappearance, the more dangerous it becomes. There are also plenty of surprising twists.

Thank you to NetGalley, Grand Central Publishing and the author for the opportunity to read this book for my honest review. All opinions expressed are my own.

I've really grown to love Frankie Elkin as she ventures out to find the missing people that society might not be searching for. In this 4th installment of the series Frankie comes to Arizona to search for a missing Afghan women named Sabera Ahmadi. Her friends feel something is off about her disappearing and seek the services of Frankie.

During the course of the investigation Frankie learns a lot about the struggles refugees face when coming to a new country. I really enjoyed how Lisa Gardner portrayed the reality these refugees encounter and how she put these experiences into the story line of the Ahmadi family. Frankie continues diligently to find answers and uncovers a trove of information that helps her crack the case.

I'd highly recommend this book. I just love Frankie!

This is my first read in the Frankie Elkin series. I loved this heroine. She is a loner, a drifter, who finds the missing. This time and this book are chocked full of mystery, and a little history. The missing is an Afghan female immigrant. The book weaves back and forth between Afghanistan and the horrific withdrawal of American troops and how that affected the people. Especially the women. When this woman and her husband find refuge in America, it is still treacherous. The mysteries that surround her disappearance and the settings inside America and Afghanistan are well written and reflective of the experiences of the refugees. The characters are interesting and their colorful histories slowly revealed, as the author peels back the mystery of the disappearance and gives the reader a glance into the conditions and lives of these refugees now located in this country. Well written with interesting plot twists, I highly recommend this book. Thanks to #NetGalley#LisaGardner#KissHerGoodbye for the opportunity to read and give a fair review of this book.

Frankie Elkin searches for the missing, the ones nobody is looking for, in order to give their loved ones closure. She finds herself in Tucson, AZ searching for an Afghan refugee, Sabera Ahmadi, who went missing three weeks prior. The police haven’t bothered searching, her husband seems unconcerned of her absence, and she left behind her three-year old daughter. As Frankie searches for clues, she soon discovers someone violent and willing to kill for what they want is after Sabera and her family.

Kiss Her Goodbye is the fourth book in the Frankie Elkin series. I really enjoy this character and all her crazy antics. Each book so far has had some wonderful side characters as well as at least one unusual creature she has to live with ( stray cat, wolf spider, coconut crab). This time she finds herself surrounded by cold blooded creatures and I’m not talking about the killer(s). This was a very enjoyable novel that I’m sure fans of Lisa Gardner will love. I can’t wait to see what case Frankie takes on next…a must read!

Frankie Elkin is particularly talented at finding missing people that no one else has been able to find. A recovering alcoholic, she lives a nomadic lifestyle, travelling from place to place when asked to find someone who has disappeared. She expects no recompense for her skills and lives simply with little baggage. Tough, intuitive and resilient, she is always prepared to go the extra mile to find the lost.

In this fourth episode in the series, Frankie travels to Tucson, Arizona in response to a request to find a missing Afghan refugee, Sabera Ahmadi. She disappeared three weeks before from her home with her husband, Isaad and four year old daughter, Zahra. The family are newly arrived in Tucson, after spending four years in a refugee camp in Abu Dhabi following the fall of Afghanistan to the Taliban.

Seeking somewhere cheap to live while in Tucson, Frankie takes a job with free accommodation in a mansion, along with a driver and car and a cook. All she has to do in return is look after a tech millionaire’s reptile collection of several pythons and a giant iguana for a month. The only problem is Frankie doesn’t like reptiles, particularly snakes, and now she has no choice but get up close to feed them.

When Sabera is sighted in a video on the news, leaving the scene of a double murder and then Isaad also disappears, Frankie begins to suspect that the Ahmadi family is in a whole lot of trouble. They’ve only been in Tucson a few weeks, so could it stem back to their life in Kabul and the past they thought they had left behind?

There are multiple layers to the plot and the reason for Sabera’s disappearance takes a while to come into focus, but the tension is palpable as we wonder if she will be found alive. The darkness caused by the danger to Sabera and her family is offset by the introduction of some colourful, larger than life secondary characters as well as Frankie’s less than expert experiences in looking after the reptiles.

Gardner’s research into the life Sabera would have lived in Afghanistan is very thorough and her heartbreaking depictions of the desperation of those trying to flee Kabul are told with empathy and compassion. She also shines a light on the difficulties refugees like Sabera and her family encounter in starting a new life in America, with only a few weeks of financial support. This gritty and immersive read could be read as a stand-alone.

Thank you for the opportunity to read this ARC.

I’ve come to love the Frankie series but unfortunately this one didn’t give the same as experience as the others. While the details of a refugee and what they experience are important I feel the first 30-40% of the book focused on it so much and it felt more like an info dump than apart of the story. The were so many characters to keep up with within the story line. The subplot of keeping the wild animals for a young tech rich guy seemed random and kinda wacky for this story. It was a hard read for me and the actual mystery of what happens to Sabera got lost at times. The ending just didn’t seem worth the task it seemed to be to feed this one.

This is my first taste of Lisa Gardner's writing and I'll be back for more! This novel works well as a
standalone because the main character, Frankie Elkin, fills in the details of what's been going on in her life in the previous three books. She travels wherever she's needed. Her specialty is working missing persons cold cases. She doesn't charge for her services because she's not a trained professional so she usually looks for work that includes food and lodging while she investigates.

In book four in this series, Frankie's been called to Tucson, AZ, where a woman named Aliah is worried about her fellow Afghan friend, Sabera, a recently-arrived refugee who has been missing for three weeks, leaving her husband and 4-year-old daughter behind.

The tale of Frankie's search for Sabera is interspersed with letters from Sabera to her daughter which document her life before the Taliban took over Afghanistan. I learned so much from those and from what Frankie learns from the people and organizations who help refugees settle into life in America. It's a heart-breaking story--what resilience it must take to start all over in a strange land. Why can't their education and expertise count for something in this country? Where's the justice in that?

While there's quite a lot of drama and tension in this story, there are also light, laugh-out-loud moments--such as when Frankie takes on the job of pet-sitting for snakes and an iguana named Petunia. I will look forward to reading more of Frankie's adventures and hope things work out for her and the man she keeps hoping will call.

Many thanks to the author and publisher for providing me with an arc of this novel via NetGalley. My review is voluntary and the opinions expressed are my own.

What fun! enjoy this multicultural detective story.

To my greatest delight I was able to read an ARC copy of a wonderful new book by Lisa Gardner . I was not disappointed .

This book "Kiss Her Goodbye" is the newest installment in her Frankie Elkins Series about a young woman who spends her time solving missing persons cold cases you know the ones that police don't bother with or have given up on.

This time the person she is looking for is a refugee from Afghanistan and it seems no one really cares she is gone.

As usual Lisa Gardner uses her skills as a criminalogist to write a really fascinating psychological thriller. I really enjoyed all the Afghanistan history that she embroidered thru out the book and the detective story was really fun to be involved with also.

I give the book 4 stars and thank #GrandCentralPublishing and #Netgalley for the pleasure of a great novel and my honest review.

2.25. I really enjoyed the first two Frankie Elkin books. The third was a flop for me but I was looking forward to giving it another go with this one. It took me forever to get through this book because I just was not excited to pick it back up. I wasn’t gripped by the story and had a hard time connecting with the characters. I just found this story kind of boring. No excitement until about 85% of the way through and I found the ending just a little too unbelievable.

Fantastic continuation of the Frankie Elkin series!

Frankie has made her way to Tucson, Arizona, to try to find an Afgahn refugee. Sabera has gone missing, leaving her husband and daughter behind, which no one believes she would do willingly.

This story is told from Frankie's POV in present day and flashbacks of Sabera's past story to her present day.

Lots of twists and turns. Very suspenseful!

I also really appreciated the authors dedication to tell the story of what it is like to be a refugee trying to survive, adapt, and grieve the loss of their past lives.

Thank you to the publisher and Netgalley for allowing me to read this ARC in an exchange for an honest review.

This book has Frankie Elkin in search of a missing Afghan refugee, Sabera Ahmadi, in Tuscan, AZ. Sabera’s friend has reported her missing and Frankie agrees to take her case. The story would be rough to read considering the plight of the refugees in the US but the author inserts just the right amount of fun in between the hard things. I don’t want to spoil anything for the readers but I might have “OH NO” laughed a few times.

Although this is book 4 in the Frankie Elkin series this book can be read as a stand alone.

"I received a complimentary copy of this book. Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own."

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Kiss Her Goodbye
By: Lisa Gardner
Publisher: Grand Central Publishing
Pub Date: 4/12/24
This is the 4th book in the Frankie Elkin series. Frankie searches for missing people without any professional training or getting paid. She usually takes on bartending jobs to make ends meet while she searches, but this time she’s pet sitting for a lizard and a bunch of This time she’s called Tucson, Arizona to locate a young Afghan refugee and her mother who vanished. Things become even more strange when her husband disappears as well.
I really enjoy the way Frankie‘s character interacts with the new characters around her who contribute to her searches and they keep the series interesting.

#lisagardner
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Though not a licensed investigator, Frankie Elkin dedicates herself to finding missing people. She does this without seeking payment or publicity, focusing on those who are not actively being searched for. And she's good at it. She has no permanent home, choosing to go wherever the cases take her, without personal belongings or attachments. Staying sober is her main priority.

Frankie's latest investigation takes her to Tucson, Arizona, in search of Sabera Ahmadi, an Afghan refugee. After the Taliban murdered her family, Sabera, her husband Isaad, and four-year-old daughter Zahra managed to reach the United States. When Sabera is seen on video leaving a double murder scene, it becomes evident that she is entangled in a dangerous situation. Shortly after, Isaad disappears, and there is an attempt to abduct Zahra. Frankie lands a side job taking care of a wealthy gamer's exotic pets, providing her with a place to stay. The homeowner's driver and cook assist Frankie in finding Sabera. The story shifts between the urgent search for Sabera and flashbacks of her time in Kabul, written in diary form. Through this, we discover the secrets Sabera brought with her to America. 

Kiss Her Goodbye is Lisa Gardner's fourth novel featuring Frankie Elkin, a complex and compassionate character I have grown to like very much. This book can be read as a standalone. Although it's a mystery thriller, it also highlights the struggles faced by refugees from war-torn Afghanistan. The story features a diverse array of intriguing characters, including a menagerie of reptiles, featuring Petunia, an iguana who enjoys watching television. Check out this captivating series.

4.25 stars.

Frankie's back. Don't worry if you haven't read this series as Gardner gives you the backstory you need to enjoy this. Fans, and I'm one, will be pleased with this latest effort by Frankie Elkin to find a missing woman in Tucson, an Afghan refugee who is a polyglot among other things. Sabera tells her story, of life in Kabul and after as Frankie hunts for her. Frankie lucks into a boffo housesitting and pet sitting job at Bart's and let's just say these are exotic pets, but the gig also comes with Darryl and Genni who are awesome. Sabera's friend is convinced she would not leave her little daughter Zahra but now Sabera's husband Isaad is missing as well and it looks as though Sabera has been involved in the murder of two men. Sabera's story unfolds in the dual time line and you'll realize that Sabera has been fighting more than one problem. Frankie's people finding skills are stretched on this one, especially since someone else is also hunting for Sabera, but Darryl and his dance partner (trust me) Roberta are worthy partners. This deserves to be read without spoilers, to be read without expectation except that it's going to twist more than once. Gardner has a way with characters and she's a terrific storyteller who is especially adept with creating tension and leavening things with a touch of humor. And here she's shined a light on the challenges faced by Afghan refugees, Don't miss the afterword. Thanks to Netgalley for the ARC. I thoroughly enjoyed this and am eagerly awaiting another search with Frankie next summer.