Review: Gone by Lisa McMann

From the author's website: Janie thought she knew what her future held. And she thought she'd made her peace with it. But she can't handle dragging Cabel down with her.

She knows he will stay with her, despite what she sees in his dreams. He's amazing. And she's a train wreck. Janie sees only one way to give him the life he deserves--she has to disappear. And it's going to kill them both.

Then a stranger enters her life--and everything unravels. The future Janie once faced now has an ominous twist, and her choices are more dire than she'd ever thought possible. She alone must decide between the lesser of two evils. And time is running out...


I have such mixed feelings on this one. After such a long wait, and a real appreciation for the first two books in this series, I expected more. I love, love, love the writing style and the characters in this series, but this book did not really advance the overall plot and both Janie and Cabel are sort of flat here. They seem to have taken steps back instead of forward, which I understand is part of life sometimes, but it seems a strange choice for the conclusion to a series.

Janie is miserable almost all the time in this book, I get that she has a tough life, but one of the great things about the previous books was her strength and ability to rise above her circumstances.

With the huge trend in YA supernatural series these days, I feel that many authors are extending their stories needlessly, I hate to say that may have happened here.

I also think the style-which I do like-is not very well suited to a series. We get disjointed moments of Janie's life, almost like photographs, and I think that is why for me the introduction of her parents as significant characters in the third and final book seemed odd.

I do love they way she writes the Janie/Cabe interactions though-really good stuff. Overall I would recommend this series despite my frustrations with this one, also reading the two previous books is a must before reading Gone.

Rating: 3