Vanishing Girls

** spoiler alert ** 5 Stars for Oliver's writing style and character development. These are two sisters, one very much flawed, and yet the way they are written is endearing and intriguing. Their tenuous connection is driven by mutual affection and insecurities, so the dynamics of their relationship seem realistic. 5 stars for the plot twist. Whereas many other readers claimed to see it coming, I did not. I was pleasantly shocked by what was really going on. ***SPOILERS BELOW***** I thought THE TWIST was very clever and something like we see in the film "The Uninvited". I do think, however, that Oliver needed to go deeper into Nick's psychology to give us a better grasp on this twist. 3 stars for the weaving between flash-backs and present time. In the beginning of the novel, especially, the back-and-forth timelines is quite confusing as is the newspaper headlines about the disappearance of 9-year-old Madeleine Snow; this felt misplaced and disruptive to the story of the two sisters. 3 stars for Oliver's explanation of the ending. When we find out that Madeleine was actually hiding, unharmed, well, this seemed like a pretty weak explanation. And when we discover that Nick was experiencing severe PTSD and personality displacement (imagining scenarios with Dara still alive), Oliver gives us very little time to digest this. More explanation about how this came to me, building that bridge between the before Nick and the after Nick is necessary. There simply was no explanation for it. With these problems aside, I really do like her writing style. She has a knack for drawing the reader into this place so that you feel like you are right next to them, and you really care what is going to happen to them next.