Reviews with content warning for Sexual assault - Girl Gone Missing

It was great to catch up with Cash again. Good for her for advocating for herself to get out of those boring intro college classes, despite the racism and sexism of her professors. She's still a badass.

I was glad that there was a little less pool, smoking, and drinking in this one because it got slightly monotonous in the first one.

The plot is interesting, especially given the author's note. Basically, there's a bunch of super smart white girls going missing and are being trafficked. Cash wants to find out what's happening to these girls and ends up putting herself in danger. Rendon talks about how she decided to make the girls white to show how people outside of a group can care about the atrocities that are happening to other people and how that should be a model for MMIWG2S.

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roq's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark emotional mysterious reflective sad tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.75

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unusualsnowunicorn's review against another edition

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dark mysterious tense slow-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated

2.75

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tangleroot_eli's review against another edition

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adventurous emotional mysterious reflective sad tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? Yes

As a noir-lover, I immediately recognize Rendon's style: staccato sentences that build a world both viscerally real and almost claustrophobic through relentless layering of details calls to mind the best works of Chandler and Hammett. But unlike those authors' stoic white male protagonists, Rendon's Cash Blackbear is a study in protective dissociation. She detaches from her emotions because, historically, her life has sucked, and feeling and expressing emotions has led to nothing but disaster. Rendon's is a classic style indelibly informed by Cash's time, place, and identity. And, oh yeah, there's a mystery, but I read this series for Cash and her world; the mystery is almost immaterial.

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raineedayreader's review against another edition

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dark emotional mysterious sad tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

5.0

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amystark's review against another edition

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tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

3.5

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annemaries_shelves's review against another edition

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mysterious fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

2.0

Unfortunately this was a disappointment for me.

Now granted, I don't often read from the mystery genre but I do enjoy it - I'm just impatient to get to the mystery resolution.

However - this was barely a mystery. We find out the first girl goes missing in the first 25-30 pages, and the second girl in 50-60 pages in. And then NOTHING HAPPENS for 150 more pages - until the final third. And even then, it's quick, predictable, and not all that gritty despite what other reviews say.

I thought - erroneously - Cash was an amateur detective type character based on the back of the book. No, she's just a traumatized young adult going to college and working, barely dealing with her past and just stumbles into whatever the (barely there) plot is. She's also really predictable as a character - nothing about her was unique or interesting. I was bored by her.

If - like me - you haven't read the first book because you got it in the Raven Reads box (which is an amazing subscription box service fyi), you definitely don't need to have read that one. It's summarized throughout this second book (as many serialized mysteries are) and I highly doubt there was any character development between the first and second novels as there was none in this one.

I appreciated the author's note as she explains the importance and tragedy of the Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls (and Two-Spirit) movement that the Canadian and American governments ignore and in many ways perpetrate. However, that note couldn't save this book.

It was a quick read and not the series for me.

CW: attempted sexual assault, drugging, off-page branding, human trafficking, PTSD from Vietnam war, previous abuse from foster homes, racist language

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carolynkwolff's review against another edition

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dark mysterious sad tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.5

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