Description
An absent father. A missing girl.
Buried family secrets. Is the truth worth searching for?
Sixteen-year-old Prue has grown up around secrets. Her gran’s stern silence, her mother’s teary breakdowns, her aunt’s whispered assurances.
But now, in the aftermath of her mum’s latest ‘episode’, Prue’s decided she’s old enough for the truth. She wants to know what it is that makes the adults around her turn tight-lipped and distracted. She wants to know why her mum can’t cope.
Most of all, she wants to know who her dad is. Forced to spend the summer in the Shetlands with her aunt, Ruth, and new uncle, Archie, Prue arrives determined to find some answers. But she soon finds herself caught up in a web of family secrets, betrayals and – perhaps – even murder…
Set during one long summer in Shetland, this is a beautifully drawn, psychologically astute novel about a young woman’s search for truth, even as she realises the lies that surround her have been keeping her safe.
‘What a beautiful, absorbing, emotional book. I was on that remote island with these characters, lost in their unfolding dramas and the barren landscape and long-past secrets. I was with young Prue on her quest to disperse the shadows of her past, and certainly identified with many of the things she had been through. A stunning read’ Louise Beech
Anna Kierczynska –
The Gone and the Forgotten is a completely different story to Clare’s first one – People of Abandoned Character, which is fascinating to see that the author can excel in a coming-of-age story as well as the historical fiction!
Prue has family issues. A lot. Her mum has tried to kill herself, her grandma passed away and she doesn’t know her father. It’s a secret. One summer her aunt Ruth invites her to a small island where she lives with her husband Archie and his grandmother. Prue, hopeful that she’ll finally learn the truth goes on a trip… and finds herself in a place with even a bigger mystery… A mystery of a missing girl, being supposedly killed by Archie 20 years prior is hanging in the air.
Is she living under the roof with a murderer?
Prue’s trying a lot of things that teenagers do, making friendship she shouldn’t have, and ones that are valuable. She makes mistakes, trying to find out who she is and what she wants in life. Most of all she wants to learn the truth, which she might come to regret after all…
The writing was great, the story flows and you can’t put the book down. It’s darker than I expected and building up to the reveal is perfect. A creepy in parts, hopeful and easy in others, made me think about all the carefree things I’ve done in my life.
I’ll definitely buy anything that Clare Whitfield writes, I can’t wait to discover what she’s going to bring us next!