Vanishing Girls

by Lauren Oliver

Overview

New York Times bestselling author Lauren Oliver delivers a gripping story about two sisters inexorably altered by a terrible accident.

Dara and Nick used to be inseparable—but that was before the accident that left Dara’s beautiful face scarred and the two sisters totally estranged.

When Dara vanishes on her birthday, Nick thinks Dara is just playing around. But another girl, nine-year-old Madeline Snow, has vanished, too, and Nick becomes increasingly convinced that the two disappearances are linked. Now Nick has to find her sister before it’s too late.

In this edgy and compelling novel, bestselling author Lauren Oliver creates a world of intrigue, loss, and suspicion as two sisters search to find themselves—and each other.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781481533904
Publisher:	HarperCollins Publishers
Publication date:	03/28/2015
Edition description:	Unabridged
Product dimensions:	6.50(w) x 6.10(h) x 1.30(d)
Age Range:	14 - 17 Years

About the Author

Lauren Oliver is the cofounder of media and content development company Glasstown Entertainment, where she serves as the president of production. She is also the New York Times bestselling author of the YA novels Replica, Vanishing Girls, Panic, and the Delirium trilogy: Delirium, Pandemonium, and Requiem, which have been translated into more than thirty languages. The film rights to both Replica and Lauren's bestselling first novel, Before I Fall, were acquired by AwesomenessTV; Before I Fall has been made into a major motion picture.

Her novels for middle grade readers include The Spindlers, Liesl & Po, and the Curiosity House series, co-written with H. C. Chester. She has written one novel for adults, Rooms.

A graduate of the University of Chicago and NYU's MFA program, Lauren Oliver divides her time between New York, Connecticut, and a variety of airport lounges. You can visit her online at www.laurenoliverbooks.com.

Editorial Reviews

★ 01/12/2015
Sisters Dara and Nick had grown up as “the Two Musketeers, the Dynamic Duo, Light and Dark, two sides of the same cookie,” but after a serious car accident, the two sisters are irrevocably distanced. As older, more reliable sister Nick tries to find her way back into Dara’s graces, their strained relationship, the boy who came between them, and the sudden disappearance of a nine-year-old girl bring secrets of a local underworld too close to home. The novel alternates between the sisters’ perspectives, both before and after the accident, while news reports, diaries, and blog posts and comments from the community create a narrative full of shades of grey. Oliver (Panic) is in top form in this psychological family drama that investigates the complicated nature of sisterhood. Perfect for readers who devoured We Were Liars, it’s the sort of novel that readers will race to finish, then return to the beginning to marvel at how it was constructed—and at everything they missed. Ages 14–up. Agent: Stephen Barbara, InkWell Management. (Mar.)

Publishers Weekly

PRAISE FOR BEFORE I FALL: “Oliver, in a pitch-perfect teen voice, explores the power we have to affect the people around us in this intensely believable first novel...This is a compelling book with a powerful message and should not be missed.

ALA Booklist

PRAISE FOR PANIC: “Oliver’s novel is a wholly believable and compulsively readable tale of friendship, loyalty, survival, and courage.

Booklist

PRAISE FOR PANIC: “Retains all the tension and excitement of Oliver’s Delirium…A work with sharp corners, dark places, and considerable humanity.

The Horn Book

Alarming and uplifting, a rare psychological thriller that has a kind heart at its center. Read it with all the lights on.

E. Lockhart

A tragic accident changes sisters Nick and Dara’s world. They were the best of friends before the accident, but now their relationship has been strained by their parent’s separation and conflict over a boy, Parker. Nick’s summer is further complicated when she is forced to take a job at an aging amusement park where she must work side by side with Parker. In town, a young girl has gone missing, and the constant reports start bringing dark memories to the forefront of Nick’s mind. Sure that Dara is avoiding her because she is caught up in a sinister secret that is somehow linked to the girl’s disappearance, Nick struggles to find the truth only to rediscover the secret she has long hidden from herself. Oliver has a proven ability to delve into psychological topics. This exploration of sisters’ friendship and how it can be impacted by tragedy does the same. The changing points of view and the addition of emails, diary entries, and texts work well to build suspense until a major plot twist is revealed. The characters, however, are bland, and a deeper exploration of their emotions would have made the twist more impactful. The conclusion wraps up everything far too neatly, and Nick’s resulting recovery lacks power. Several plot elements, including the missing girl and a death at the amusement park, feel detached and strained, even when they are connected. Fans of Oliver and those who enjoy psychological thrillers will be engaged, but other readers may find the overall effect confusing. Reviewer: Rachel Wadham; Ages 15 to 18.

VOYA, February 2015 (Vol. 37, No. 6) - Rachel Wadham

11/01/2014
Gr 9 Up—Different as night and day, sisters Nick and Dara are practically joined at the hip. Nick is perpetually the cool and calm older one who calls the shots. Dara is always tagging along, longing to be in the spotlight. That was before the accident that left Dara injured and Nick shaken to the core. Now, the siblings barely speak to each other; they live together but never cross paths. Nick gets a job at a local amusement park and begins to interact with people again, mostly with her longtime best friend, but also with her sister's ex-boyfriend, Parker. As the summer continues, a young local girl goes missing and Nick finds herself getting more involved with the ensuing drama than she ever expected. The situation comes to a boiling point at Dara's birthday dinner when she disappears too, and it's up to Nick to piece the story together and discover what has happened to her sister. Like in her "Delirium" series and Before I Fall (2010, both HarperCollins), Oliver's characterizations and background stories are well-developed and compulsively readable. The relationship between Nick and Dara drives the plot and is very realistic. The twist the author incorporates at the end is dramatic without being absurd and was completely unexpected. Recommend to teens looking for a well-written work with a juicy ending. They will not be disappointed.—Morgan Brickey, Marion County Public Library System, FL

School Library Journal

2014-12-10
Two sisters' lives are irrevocably changed by a shared accident.Nick and her younger sister, Dara, are two sides of an impossibly complicated familial coin—different in almost every way yet bound together by blood and circumstance. When Nick walks away from a terrible accident that leaves her sister permanently scarred, the resulting wounds, both physical and emotional, leave both girls reeling, struggling to redefine who they are as individuals and in relation to each other. The "Before" and "After" are told from both Dara's and Nick's points of view through a series of flashbacks, present-day accounts, and diary and blog entries. Unfortunately, what could have been a powerful exploration of two young women picking up the pieces after a sudden and costly accident becomes lost in a novel that simply tries to do too much. Most notably, Oliver attempts to weave together Nick and Dara's story with a tangential plotline about the disappearance of a 9-year-old girl. It takes far too long for the threads connecting the two to become apparent, and for the better part of the novel, the subplot feels like a distraction. Far too much time is spent on a tepid love triangle when it would have been put to better use developing some of the more intriguing aspects of the story. This is an uneven read that suffers from grandiose ambitions. (Fiction. 14 & up)

Kirkus Reviews