A review by life_full_ofbooks
The Weight of Silence by Heather Gudenkauf

adventurous dark emotional mysterious tense medium-paced

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

3.0

This has been on my TBR for 9 years and I jumped at the chance to finally listen to it, especially when I saw it was a full cast recording. The beginning sucked me in but it started fizzling out towards the middle and while there was one gasp out loud moment towards the end, it wasn’t anything that turned this around for me. 

Calli Clark is 7 years old and, to the curiosity of everyone around her, she hasn’t spoken a word in 3 years. Petra Gregory, also 7, lives across the street and is not only Calli’s best friend, but also her voice. Both the Clark and Gregory families wake up to discover that both girls are missing. While the police and the feds are called in, Petra’s father and Calli’s brother take to the woods to find the girls. What they find there changes both families forever and makes the parents rethink every decision they’ve made in the past. 

Part suspense, part family drama, The Weight of Silence is told from the point of view of 6 characters. Each character gives us deeper insight into both what’s going on in the moment and what events of the past has brought them to where they are now. 

While I enjoyed the characters of Calli and Petra, I had a very hard time imagining them 7 years old. Petra’s parts are written first person, and it doesn’t really read like a 7 year old is doing the talking. 

As I stated earlier, I found the beginning to be fascinating, but the middle of the book kind of stalled out, and the end felt rushed. It just seemed like the ending wasn’t really flushed out and was just tossed in quickly as a way to finish it and while it was just ok to begin with, the ending did nothing to enhance it.