Owen Pick's life is falling apart. In his thirties and living in his aunt's spare bedroom, he has just been suspended from his job as a teacher after accusations of sexual misconduct--accusations he strongly denies. Searching for professional advice online, he is inadvertently sucked into the dark world of incel forums, where he meets a charismatic and mysterious figure.Across the street from Owen lives the Fours family, headed by mom Cate, a physiotherapist, and dad Roan, a child psychologist. But the Fours family have a bad feeling about their neighbor Owen. He's a bit creepy and their teenaged daughter swears he followed her home from the train station one night.Meanwhile, young Saffyre Maddox spent three years as a patient of Roan Fours. Feeling abandoned when their therapy ends, she searches for other ways to maintain her connection with him, following him in the shadows and learning more than she wanted to know about Roan and his family. Then, on Valentine's night, Saffyre disappears--and the last person to see her alive is Owen Pick.
Invisible Girl is a mom pick. I reminded her that I got her this for Christmas since she loves Lisa Jewell books. I've never read one but since I've been buying her like all of them I might as well see what the hubbub is about.
Invisible Girl follows multiple perspectives. Owen, who everyone considers a creep, is accused of sexual misconduct, and is the last person to see a teenage girl who's gone missing. Surprisingly, I felt bad for Owen from the beginning. There was just something about him that made me think this guy a chance. His story gets more complex as you go on and as a main suspect you are trying to see wait, is he really a good guy who made bad decisions or has he been doing bad deeds and acting like he hasn't?
Then there is Cate who really annoyed me with the majority of the story. She was very judgmental when her husband is highly suspect too since he was the psychologist of the girl who went missing. He's has been critical of his wife so I understand. There are a lot of questions there too if Cate has mental health issues and is misidentifying matters. I get to like her more towards the last half eventually. I loved Josh, her son the most. Her daughter didn't really add anything but her son was so sweet to her but also kind of suspect himself. In a thriller, who isn't?
Lastly, there is Saffyre who mostly had chapters set in the past to her actual disappearance. Before I talk about Saffyre I just want to mention how wonderful her Uncle/Guardian is. He's young himself, in his 20's, and is just so loving. So on to Saffyre, she did have something happen to her as a child. I will warn you there are sexual assault cases happening throughout the book so if you don't read about that, skip this book. Saffyre was such a mystery. I mean of course she would be but I really enjoyed her complexity. She was so intriguing to follow around.
The multiple complex POV's, the intense atmosphere, and mystery were done so well for me. It's a very different kind of thriller then I was expecting. It was a lot of character building and slowly figuring out about each of them. I was always back and forth with who it was and what happened to Saffyre. I really enjoyed how everything concluded. I think everything was done in a clever way. I'll be sure to be reading more by Lisa Jewell in the future.
What was the last good thriller you read?
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