Estimated read time: 2-3 minutes
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The start of Kelly Braffet's new novel, Last Seen Leaving, sets a mysterious tone with an edgy undercurrent promising something sinister to come.
A young woman goes to a bar, winds up having sex in a parked car, gets in an argument with the guy and then takes off alone.
She crashes on the highway in the dark and rainy night, and a stranger offers to give her a ride.
She accepts, but he doesn't turn off when she points to her exit.
Uh-oh.
If only that prologue paid off. From the first chapter on, the story mostly revolves around Anne Cassidy, a 48-year-old New Age bookstore worker who is so grief-stricken from the death of her pilot husband Nick that she barely gets through the day without imagining him nearby and wondering exactly what caused his plane to be shot from the sky over Central America.
Anne, who hasn't had a great relationship with daughter Miranda since Nick died, finally realizes Miranda is missing and heads from Sedona, Ariz., to Pittsburgh to track her down and, at the same time, come to grips with Nick's death.
Rebellious and angry ever since her father died, Miranda, it turns out, left no clues behind when she headed to the bar that night, and the search seems futile.
Josie and Jack, Braffet's first novel (published last year), was a dark and captivating story about an unusually brilliant and beautiful brother and sister who loved each other more than they should.
Last Seen Leaving doesn't reach that depth or complexity. It's more like an episode of CSI or Without a Trace -- fast-paced and enjoyable, but not particularly artful or enduring.
Last Seen Leaving
By Kelly Braffet
Houghton Mifflin, 260 pp., $23
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