Before She Disappeared--A Novel

Starred review from November 23, 2020
Recovering alcoholic Frankie Elkin, the narrator of this outstanding crime novel from bestseller Gardner (When You See Me), has found purpose, if not peace, in channeling her addictive personality into finding missing women no one else bothers to search for. Newly arrived in Boston, Frankie sets out on the trail of 16-year-old Angelique Lovelie Badeau, who seems destined to beat the odds in her tough Haitian community. What would drive Angelique, a girl with such a bright future, to simply disappear one day? Frankie’s search leads her through a thicket of gangs, traffickers, and institutional racism. The mystery’s solution is a neat twist on the obvious dangers that might destroy a talented girl’s dreams. Frankie, who describes herself as an “average middle-aged white woman,” is a nuanced character whose unflinching honesty and lack of self-pity allows the reader to empathize, if not completely sympathize, with her struggles. And cat lovers are sure to fall for Piper, Frankie’s equally dysfunctional feral companion. Gardner pulls no punches in this socially conscious standalone. Agent: Meg Ruley, Jane Rotrosen Agency.

December 15, 2020
Vagabond investigator Frankie Elkin (think Reacher with the gift of gab over guns) lands in Boston's rough-edged Mattapan neighborhood on a mission to find Angelique Badeau, a teenager who disappeared 11 months earlier. In a blink, Frankie has secured a bartending job at the neighborhood drinking hole, found an AA meeting, and pissed off the cops investigating Angelique's disappearance. (They're not buying her investigation as public service, and she's not enlightening them about her need for redemption.) Frankie is sure that Angelique isn't a runaway: she's too close to her Aunt Guerline and her brother, Emmanuel. So Frankie pokes the soft spots in Angelique's inner circle and finds that Angelique grew secretive after participating in a rec-center program where she befriended Livia Samdi, another missing Mattapan teen, whose gangland connections up the stakes. When Emmanuel reports that Angelique has left him a coded plea for help online, Frankie's baggage-laden obsession pushes her straight into Mattapan's underworld. It's hard to tag just one stand-out element here, between the multidimensional portrayal of Mattapan's Haitian expat community, Frankie's humanizing demons and straightforward investigative technique, and a page-turning plot with all its ends tucked in unpredictably tight. Tense and immersive, Gardner's latest (hopefully a series starter) is a sure bet both for readers drawn to gritty gumshoe fiction and for the growing legion of true-crime podcast fans.

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January 8, 2021

It's been a while since Gardner (When You See Me) wrote a stand-alone; this one is well worth the wait. Readers will fall in love with her protagonist, Frankie Elkin, a recovering alcoholic lost soul who keeps sober by running from her past and roaming from city to city seeking cold-case missing people that law enforcement has given up on. After 14 cases, she's hoping to finally rescue her first living victim, Angelique Badeau, a local Haitian high school girl who went missing without a trace several months ago. As Frankie works this puzzling case, readers will have to pay close attention to the subtle carrots Gardner dangles in front of them. It's a wild ride through Boston's Mattapan neighborhood; a mix of real and imagined dangerous streets where her local characters perfectly reflect the rich mix of island cultures there. VERDICT Fans of this incredible author, police procedurals, timely immigrant stories, strong determined women, and tales that are not tied up with a pretty bow at the end will not be able to get enough of this intense page-turner.--Debbie Haupt, St. Charles City-Cty. Lib. Dist., St. Peters, MO

Copyright 2021 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

March 15, 2021
Gardner introduces Frankie Elkin, a tough, street-smart survivor who has found her calling searching for missing persons. Frankie is an alcoholic who considers herself responsible for the death of the man she loved. As penance, she travels around the country, volunteering to locate missing people for whom there may be no new leads. She knows that not everyone believes in her gifts or trusts her motives, but she cannot back down from the opportunity to find answers for these grieving families. When she comes to Boston to investigate the disappearance of Angelique Badeau, she takes a cheap apartment and a bartending job at a scruffy neighborhood bar, sticking out like a sore thumb but determined to make headway in a case that has baffled the police. Teenagers go missing and teenagers run away, but not Angelique. She and her brother survived the earthquake in Haiti to live with their aunt in America, taking advantage of opportunities to work hard and get a good education. Frankie discovers that Angelique is not the only teenage girl to have disappeared in the neighborhood; a few months after her, another girl went missing. This girl's family, torn apart by gang violence and poverty, may have been reason enough to run away, but Frankie has been around the block enough to know: There are no coincidences. Then Angelique passes a message to her brother: proof of life, but no hint as to where she's being held. With the help of a ruggedly handsome detective, Frankie digs relentlessly into the case--until people start dying. Now in a race against time, she must discover why these girls have been kidnapped--and why they might be running out of time. Gardner is a pro at writing tough-as-nails, wiseass, broken-yet-steely female characters, and Frankie does not disappoint. Plus, it's a pretty solid mystery. Fans of Gardner's Tessa Leoni, D.D. Warren, and Flora Dane will embrace her new heroine's grit and empathy.

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