Review: If You Find Me by Emily Murdoch

Stunning story that is equally brutal and beautiful. A masterpiece.

If You Find Me Summary

Carey is keeping a terrible secret. If she tells, it could destroy her future. If she doesn’t, will she ever be free?

For almost as long as she can remember, Carey has lived in the heart of the woods with her drug-addicted mother and six-year-old sister, Jenessa.

Their mother routinely disappears for weeks at a time, leaving the girls to cope along. Survival is Carey’s only priority – until strangers arrive and everything changes.

Add If You Find Me to your Amazon Wishlist.

My Thoughts

This book is fantastically unusual and completely captivating. It’s both tragic and heart-warming, demonstrating how much a person’s life can change depending on the family they were lucky or unlucky enough to be born into.

It’s shocking and sometimes disturbing, but I loved reading about a girl so strong yet so weak, trying to adapt to a world she had forgotten existed.

There are twists, there are brutal and harrowing moments that’ll stay with me for a long time yet, but there are so many moments in this novel that reminded me how incredible human beings can be. There are some terrible people in this world and Carey encounters some of the worst kinds but thanks to the support of other humans and the strength that she’s holding onto within herself, she begins to overcome some of the most awful things anyone can ever experience and it’s such a brilliant thing to read about.

Excitingly, If You Find Me is set to be made into a movie in the coming years and there’s no doubt that I’ll be watching it. I hope they can do this incredible book justice.

Thinking about it now, I’m not completely sure why I didn’t put If You Find Me in my top ten reads of 2015! Doh! I definitely think it deserved a spot in there. I’ll certainly be including it in future recommendation round-ups.

What did you think about If You Find Me? I’d love to know. Let me know in the comments section below or on Twitter.

My rating:

***** 5/5 stars

You might also like:

The Sky Is Everywhere by Jandy Nelson

Between the Lives by Jessica Shirvington

Unbecoming by Jenny Downham

Drop by Katie Everson

I’ll Give You The Sun by Jandy Nelson