I Found You - Mystery Review

Goodreads:  I Found You by Lisa Jewell

Rating:  Very Good
Source:  Library (Audio)

Description:  'How long have you been sitting out here?''I got here yesterday.'
'Where did you come from?'
'I have no idea.'

East Yorkshire: Single mum Alice Lake finds a man on the beach outside her house. He has no name, no jacket, no idea what he is doing there. Against her better judgement she invites him in to her home.

Surrey: Twenty-one-year-old Lily Monrose has only been married for three weeks. When her new husband fails to come home from work one night she is left stranded in a new country where she knows no one. Then the police tell her that her husband never existed.

Two women, twenty years of secrets and a man who can't remember lie at the heart of Lisa Jewell's brilliant new novel.

Genre: Mystery

Why I Picked This Book: I've been wanting to read this author for ages and this one sounded especially intriguing.

My Impression:  There are 3 story lines here.

One in 1993 featuring the very ordinary Ross family.  Two very ordinary parents and two ordinary kids - 18 year old Gray and 15 year old Kirsty.  They're on an ordinary summer vacation until things take a not so ordinary turn.

The second is present day Yorkshire in a little town on the bay where 40 something single mother, Alice, notices a man standing on the beach for hours.  A man with no memory other than occasional disturbing flashes.

And in Surrey 21 year old Lily Monrose, newly married and new to the country, is anxiously waiting for her husband to come home.  Except he doesn't.

All three of these storylines are connected though I changed my mind about how several times.    Of the three stories I liked Alice's the most.  She has a history of making bad decisions and she's got a bit of a chip on her shoulder but she's so honest and loves her children dearly and is just doing the best she can.  The fact that her relationship with the stranger isn't the best decision but I can't help but sympathize with her motivations.

I didn't really like Lily but I felt very sorry for her.  She finds herself completely alone with no resources in a country where she doesn't understand the culture.  She is abrasive and demanding but the thread of terror underlying all her actions kept her sympathetic.

The 1993 story was the hardest for me to listen to because there was such a sense of dread surrounding these perfectly nice people.

Watching everything slowly come together kept me enthralled and as dysfunctional as these characters were I was sad when the book ended because my time with them was over.

Would I Read More of this Series/Author

Would I Recommend this Book?