When Georgina is a toddler, she’s kidnapped out of her stroller at a Mardi Gras parade. Fourteen years later, her mother spots her working at a coffee shop. Harper has never given up hope, but this seems unbelievable. The police confirm it, though. Lilla, the coffee shop employee, is indeed the lost Georgina. Reunited with her original family, of whom she has no memory, Lilla struggles to make sense of her past and her new life, just as her old family struggles to adjust to this new reality.

In a single sentence, this book had a very interesting idea that was only so-so executed. However, I’m not sure if that’s my opinion because it’s how I would feel any time reading this book, or because right now books just aren’t really appealing to me and I’m easily bored. (Or because I read this as an e-book, and dislike that format.) So take the rest of this review with a grain of salt, because this might just be curmudgeon-Manda talking.

I never felt like Lilla/Georgina’s psychology was completely right. While I imagine there would be a lot of flip-flopping emotions, things seem to come/go too easily for her. I highly disliked Harper throughout the entire book, especially because she refused to use her daughter’s preferred name. Harper’s relationship with her younger daughter, Jojo, seemed to change every other chapter, not realistically but however would best suit the story at that moment. And I didn’t really understand the dad’s viewpoint at all, because he’s the only family member that never gets any chapters to narrate and basically existed as a non-character. Furthermore, the story had one of my biggest pet peeves – explaining basic cultural references rather than just letting them explain themselves (or letting the reader look them up if they don’t know them). I don’t need the plot of Stranger Things described so that the term “the upside down” could be used to describe Lilla’s world.

Over all, the book didn’t work for me. I kept reading because I was bored and didn’t have anything else to do, and that’s the worst reason for me to keep reading. I never enjoy books under those circumstances, so I don’t know why I continue them! My apologies.