What Happens Next ~ Review

What Happens Next

By Christina Suzann Nelson

Faith Byrne's life has taken an unexpected turn, one that finds her on the other side of a divorce. Worse, her ex is getting remarried in Hawaii and has decided that their daughters will spend the entire upcoming Summer vacation there with him and his new(almost) wife. With her summer open except for her podcast, which ironically looks for the happy, the triumph after tragedy, she's at loose ends.

But a letter draws her back to her childhood, to her happy summer. But what she didn't know was that the summer that meant everything to her until she was once again uprooted ended with questions and sorrow for those she left behind. Her best friend of that summer, and possibly of her entire life, went missing, and still no one knows what happened to Heather. Can Faith's skills in searching out the truth, of digging deeper, help her bring Heather home and closure to a family needing to know the truth?

What Happens Next is a powerful and moving story as one woman holds out hope that someday her daughter will return. But what does such hope cost? Dora's family has crumbled around her as she stubbornly, in their opinion, refuses to accept the truth - the truth that Heather is never returning. 

This is a situation that I think no one can know how they will respond to it. When someone we love is suddenly missing, how long do we hold out hope that they will be found, that they will walk through the door? The author presents well the various characters in both the past and the present day, giving us a look at the summer leading up to the moment when Heather disappears and the present-day search for the truth. This is an emotional story with depths and twists as everyone works through the pain they were left with. This would make an excellent book club selection, and as the setting is summer, would make a perfect summer read too.

What Happens Next will be what you are wondering throughout!

I was provided a complimentary copy of this book with no expectations but that I provide my honest opinion. All thoughts expressed are my own.

About the Book:

Everyone has a story, 

and maybe everyone needs a little help toward healing.

Popular podcaster and ex-reporter Faith Byrne made a name for herself telling stories of greatness after tragedy--but her real life does not mirror the stories she tells. While her daughters spend the summer in Hawaii with her ex-husband and his new wife, she must manage life on her own. All of that changes when she's asked to spotlight her childhood best friend's missing person case on her podcast.

Dora Crane has never accepted that her younger daughter could be dead, keeping her home looking the same as when her daughter disappeared. But when her husband leaves her and her older daughter intervenes, she agrees to counseling and to pack up her missing daughter's belongings under one condition: Faith Byrne comes to Deep Valley and sheds light on the cold case.

As the long-abandoned investigation moves forward, old wounds and long-buried secrets are exposed. Will these two women, whose lives have never been the same, finally get the answers they need to reconcile the past and the future?