Jennifer Mathieu has become one of my favorite YA writers. She takes an unlikely event, and creates a storyline that every reader can still find themselves in. Afterward was one of those stories. Recommended.

A slow moving but very intense book about child kidnapping, the rescue and the aftereffects on every connected to it. Not sure why there's a red balloon on the cover?

This book was honestly so great. I've always been interested in true crime and how the victims still living go on with their lives afterwards. This book was a beautiful story of the aftermath of two kidnappings. I truly loved it and the broken strength the characters held as they healed from something so tramatic.

What a heartbreaking read! I knew from the synopsis, the story was going to be a tearjerker, but I was certainly impressed with the emotion that the author was able to draw out of me. I liked that there was also a strong focus on healing after trauma and the importance of therapy of not only the individual, but the family as well. Look forward to reading more from the author!

Review posted on Goodreads and Amazon.

This absolutely heartbreaking and hopeful at the same time.

I loved being in Caroline and Ethan's head. They're both going through different sides of the same horrible thing and I really enjoyed seeing how they grew and got stronger. There are some great secondary characters, but I loved Ethan's therapist the most.

The plot line is realistic and touches on serval different aspects of the aftermath. I would have loved to see a bit more from the ending, but how it ended was still perfect. I'm just greedy.

Out of all of Jennifer's books I think I liked this one the least. It wasn't terrible I just had a hard time getting through it. It took me 2 months to read this tiny book and then I forgot almost all of what I read within a few days. I just remember not liking it very much.

Really let down with this book, it was not at all what I was hoping and I found myself falling asleep. I am not interested in reviewing this.

Beautiful and tragic. Really great character development. Deep stuff handled really well. Enjoyable to read.

Unfortunately, this was a DNF book for me. I may revisit this title at a later date to try once again, but in the meantime, i have chosen not to include coverage on the book on my blog.

When Caroline’s brother is kidnapped, his rescue effort reveals he was not the only victim. Ethan, now a teenager, has been living with the man who captured both boys for several years now.

Caroline is desperate to help her younger brother, who is non-verbal and has autism, but her parents are at war with each other and in denial. She just can’t help wondering if Ethan can help her find out what happened to them and how she can help her brother.

Ethan is struggling to adjust to life back at his parents and to deal with the abuse he endured. With the help of a therapist, it seems he might be able to find some normalcy. When he meets Caroline, a strange sort of friendship blossoms between the two teens, and they will help each other in more ways than one.

Harrowing read, but interesting, couldn’t put it down.