Let me just start by saying this is my first Caleb Roehrig book. I have heard great things about his writing. I didn't hate this book. Was it my favorite book I've ever read? No. Would I read it again? Also no. But I didn't regret reading it. 
I'm not against LGBTQ books by any means, but I felt like it was really awkward in this one. I loved the love interest, but I didn't care for the MC. I liked the mystery, I liked the not knowing. I liked the suspense and it even had me holding my breath in parts. But I feel like the romance part overtook the mystery. Roehrig made the book mostly about that, when it really should've been about figuring out what happened to January (Also I love this as a name!) As a whole, not a bad book. Just had some changes I would've liked to see. I'll try one more Roehrig book and if I don't care for that one, I probably won't pick up another.

Unfortunately this book has gone in my DNF pile. It just wasn't engaging me like it would have years ago when I first requested it. My reading tastes have changed a lot over the years as I've gotten older and unfortunately some of the books requested years ago have been affected by my reading tastes and the fact that a lot of books for younger audiences haven't been grasping my attention as of late. I thank you for the opportunity to read and review this book.

I’ve never wrote a review for this novel back when I received it. Unfortunately, I’ve never got the chance to finish it, first because the title was archived on Netgalley and second because I’ve lost interest while reading it, so I ended up putting it down.

Why am I so bad at leaving NG reviews?! I read this book a few years ago and devoured it. It was filled with so much emotion and I just loved the chapters. They mystery was compelling but it was the narrator, Flynn, that kept me turning the pages. This book was the start of my literary love affair with Roehrig and I will read any mystery that he writes.

Last Seen Leaving combines two books in one. The first is the mystery surrounding the disappearance of a teenager. This part wasn't really special, it was nice enough, but having read a couple of these books before, it becomes rather formulaic with little surprises. 

On the other hand, there is the coming of age story of the main character, which was way more interesting as he struggles with his true self and is trying to keep his own secret, well, secret. I wish the book would have focused more on this aspect. 

Thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for providing me with a free copy of this book in exchange for an honest review!

I'm a sucker for a girl-gone-missing story, and Roehrig did not disappoint. This story most,y becomes a coming-of-age tale but the mystery keeps the narrative interesting. Students will definitely enjoy this read.

Excellent book! Roehrig had me flipping pages to see what happened next. There was a sinister vibe throughout which made this the perfect YA mystery.

Sorry it took so long, but it has been close to 3 years since I read this.  From what I remember it was an excellent fast paced read that I read in one sitting.

I don't read many YA books, but the synopsis sounded so intriguing I had to pick this one up.

The story was well written and the characters were interesting; however, I do believe it would be better to mention that one of the characters is gay.

I really loved this book! It was such a cool blend between a mystery thriller and a contemporary coming out story. It got my heart pounding so hard at times from suspense! It has mixed reviews, but I would definitely recommend it.

Flynn's girlfriend January is missing. As Flynn digs into her disappearance he learns that January had so many secrets. Flynn is hiding a secret of his own, and, with the investigation intensifying, it's one he probably won't be able to keep even though he's not ready to share this secret with the world.

LAST SEEN LEAVING was Caleb Roehrig's debut novel, and it's a great debut. This is a good pick for fans of YA thrillers. The mystery had me hooked, and I really enjoyed seeing the threads unravel. I did guess the culprit early on, which is always a bit of a bummer as I'd rather be shocked, but the author had plenty of other tricks up his sleeve that I did not see coming.

Although the mystery aspect of this story fell a little flat for me, the coming of age aspect really pulled this story through. I will definitely be reading more from this author in the future!

This was an outstanding read that I was not expecting. I went into it excited and it turned into a glorious read. This is a YA thriller so I can't go into it without giving it away. But know that this author is outstanding and just marvelous and I am forever a reader of his.

This book was very predictable and therefore my interest among the pages wavered

I liked this. It was a halfway decent YA thriller and I appreciated that the protagonist was gay, but overall it took most of the plot points I expected. There was a misdirection of the mystery halfway through, and overall it was enjoyable, but didn't really surprise me at all.

Excellent YA mystery novel that I regret not reading earlier. The right amount of mystery to give me ideas of the ending but totally surprising me once I get there. Love and friendship are key points in this as well. Flynn and January appear to be the perfect couple. As January shows up missing one day, Flynn recount the last few months of their relationship and things don't seem as wonderful as they appear. This book takes you through many suspects, including Flynn, and amazing revelations in the lives of those involved. 

I received this ARC from NetGalley for an honest opinion. Thank you!

Last Seen Leaving is a riveting YA thriller that keeps you guessing. There are so many suspects, including the main guy Flynn himself, but what actually happened to January? That's the question that drives this gripping pageturner as you're racing to find the answer out for yourself. Though I had my guesses that were pretty close to the truth, this is not one of those books where you have it all figured out from the very beginning. I highly recommend to thriller fans of all ages, teens on up.

I am really struggling with how to start out this review, because I don't want to spoil any of the mysteries of this novel. However, that would be nearly impossible, so if you don't want to know ANYTHING about Last Seen Leaving before you read it...then you really shouldn't be looking at reviews at all should you?

It starts out with our main character, Flynn, being questioned by cops. His girlfriend, January, has gone missing and of course, as is customary with every missing person case, you always start with the ones closest to that person. He tells them what he knows, which isn't much, but he's not content to just sit back and wait for the cops to figure out where she is. He embarks on a rather dangerous journey of unearthing clues to January's whereabouts with an unlikely ally: Kaz, the guy he viewed as his competition.

Flynn's secret is revealed toward the beginning of the book, but it's hinted at even before the author comes right out and says it. The last time he saw her, January tried to come on to him in a sexual way and he turned her down, which understandably upset her. This might not seem like a big deal, but this wasn't the first time it had happened and she pretty much had caught on by that point. While reading this I remembered my high school boyfriend, my very first. I thought guys were supposed to be horny 24/7 and constantly try to get in your pants, as January assumed. I know not all guys are like that, but I would say most wouldn't appear almost repulsed at a girl's touch. Just as Flynn reacted, my boyfriend at the time didn't seem to like to be touched by me at all. It made him very uncomfortable. It should have seemed obvious, and it does looking back on it, but at the time I thought he was just different. Turns out he didn't have any problem with physical contact...just not with girls. And he didn't come out until after high school, because we all know school is hard enough without dealing with ignorant, hateful people. Flynn's big reveal was a lot smoother than I expected, and maybe a lot smoother than most people's experiences coming out during their school years.

I went through a wide variety of emotions where January was concerned. At first I felt bad for her, then I started to think she was an evil little witch, and then another revelation had me feeling terrible for her. By the end, I could pretty much understand why she did most of the things she did.

Around the halfway point I scoffed and said, "Oh this is too easy, I've already got it figured out." I was disappointed because I thought I was just going to sit there and wait until the end of the book for Flynn and Kaz to figure out what I had deduced fairly quickly. Much to my amazement, on the very next page Kaz voiced the conclusion I had just come to. Oh, so I guess I'm not as on the ball as I thought and these characters are actually smarter than the average. There's a lot of misdirection at play in this novel, and it does a pretty good job of keeping you guessing right up until the very end.

Also, the police force in this town was basically worthless. Maybe this was their first potential homicide case they had ever worked on, but based on the circumstances around January's disappearance they obviously weren't interviewing the right people. It's okay guys, let the teenage boy handle it.

I didn't love the ending. It was alright, and I kind of saw it coming, but I think it would have had more of an impact if the author had taken a different route with it. This is hard to explain without giving too much away, so I'll just leave it at that.

I found Last Seen Leaving to be a very intriguing read, from seeing Flynn finally embrace who he was, to trying to solve the mystery of what happened to January. If you love a good mystery novel as much as I do, then you'll definitely want to check this one out.

Cleaning my netgalley out of books that didn't get downloaded onto my kindle. Sorry I didn't get to this novel.

my rating: ★★☆☆☆

PROS

First off, the main line was awesome:

“There was a corpse in my neighbour’s front yard.”

Amazing cover, enticing premise and the protagonist is gay.

Last Seen Leaving gave me some serious Halloween vibes, it’s thrilling and short and I totally recommend that you guys pick this one up in October. It’s short enough that you could read it all on the night and still give yourself a bit of a scare. Though, this is just my opinion, Halloween is bull and you people are all really weird.

CONS

I really wanted to enjoy this but unfortunately when it came down to it and I thought about it for a minute, the cons outweigh the pros.

I am quite the Veronica Mars nerd and I have had my dalliances with the odd Nancy mystery, so I really thought I would love this novel, I’m pretty into teenage mystery solvers apparently. Unfortunately I just couldn’t get into this one, I just found it too unbelievable. I’m used to protagonists with backbone, who have a knack for the trade if you know what I mean. Characters like Veronica Mars (whom I love, if you couldn’t already tell) have a backbone and obviously have mystery inclined minds. They also have actual investigating skills and equipment, whereas Flynn solves a mystery, comes out as gay and I can’t even think if a third thing that happens, all in two weeks, solving a case that the police couldn’t???

Rather than a thriller this is a coming of age – it’s not really about finding out how January disappeared, though that is a large part of it. The novel is more so about Flynn finding out who he is and about him coming to terms with his sexuality.

I guess this just wasn’t what I’m used to with thrillers and maybe I should just get over myself. But I found the slow pacing and lack of an actual thriller to be a big let down for me. The story tends to rely mostly on misunderstandings and a hole lot of miscommunication and that’s something I really dislike in pretty much any type of media. I prefer a fast paced mind-fuck (for lack of a better term) compared to a slow-paced, and frankly, boring mystery. But that’s just me, because I can see that a lot of people devoured this book, so definitely read some of those reviews too before you pick it up!

ALSO, last thing I promise! I have seen soo many people pitching this as YA Gone Girl and can I stop you right there please and thank you?

I have read Gone Girl and it is one of my favourite books of all time, I love it and urge you all to read it. And people are comparing this sub par mystery to the mind-fuck of the century? NO, I cannot let this stand, sure, they have some similarities but that’s where it ends, the two are in no way in the same league, let alone the same rating box. I know that sounds harsh as hell but I loved that book and Last Seen Leaving just wasn’t as good, in my opinion.

QUICK OVERVIEW

-The self discovery aspect of this novel was really interesting to read.
-While this wasn’t a groundbreaking novel or anything new, really but it was a quick mystery I found easy to get through in between my classes.
-Slow paced
-I think the main character is 15 and the book ends with him dating a college student and that’s a reasonably large age/maturity gap, though we’re never told the guy’s age.