Book Review: Nearly Found (Nearly Gone, #2) by Elle Cosimano

NEARLY FOUND

Book Series: Nearly Gone, Book #2

Author: Elle Cosimano (Twitter)

Genres: YA, Thriller, Mystery

Format: Hardcover (Amazon)

Length: 384 pages

Release Date: June 2, 2015

Reading Challenges: 2015 Goodreads Challenge

After Nearly Boswell starts working as an intern at a crime lab, a girl from her trailer park turns up dead. Then the corpse of a missing person is discovered, buried on a golf course, with a message for Nearly etched into the bones. When Nearly finds out the corpse is the father of Eric, a classmate of hers, she starts to worry that the body is connected to her father's disappearance five years ago. Nearly, Reece, and Nearly's classmates--Vince, Jeremy, and Eric--start a dangerous investigation into their fathers' pasts that threatens Nearly's fragile romance with Reece, and puts all them in the killer's path. 

This is hard. While I did enjoy this book, I feel like it had less to do with this particular work and more to do with my being invested in Nearly's world. I loved the first book, but this. Meh. For me, the plot was a little too recycled. I would have much preferred the book to have gone in a different direction when it came to motive. While I did say engaged, I feel like that was more because I was invested in Nearly as a character than I was in the story.

One thing I did miss was the scientific element. Yes, it was present but it was more flat. In Nearly Gone, the ways that science was used to execute the murders was so much more interesting. It was almost as if science was a sinister accomplice In this book, just the formulas left me underwhelmed.

I didn't enjoy was how angsty Nearly came off in this book. She was such a strong character in the first book, and that was missing. So much of what she did was driven by guilt and a sense of duty to relieve her guilt. Last time, she was more of a detective. I liked that.

I hope this isn't the end of the series. I like Elle's storytelling. She's created an intricate, mysterious world full of interesting characters. I will be happy to read more from her, and home she gets her "ultimate" answer.

“But maybe we aren't the sum of our mistakes or our genes or our circumstances or our fears.  Maybe, in the end, we're the products of our choices. And maybe it's when we hold someone's life in our hands—the choices we make in those moments—when we get a taste of what we're truly made of.”
― Nearly