Elizabeth Is Missing (Healey) - Book Reviews

Book Reviews
Maud Horsham, the narrator of Emma Healey’s spellbinding first novel…is aware that she’s slipping into dementia.… It’s a sad and lonely business watching your identity slowly slip away. But even at the end, Maud insists on making herself heard and understood.
New York Times Book Review


[A] knockout debut…. Ms. Healey’s audacious conception and formidable talent combine in a bravura performance that sustains its momentum and pathos to the last.
Wall Street Journal


Elizabeth Is Missing is every bit as compelling as the… hype suggests.… The novel is both a gripping detective yarn and a haunting depiction of mental illness, but also more poignant and blackly comic than you might expect.
Observer (UK)


This is no conventional crime novel but a compelling work that crosses literary genres.… The result is bold, touching and hugely memorable.
Sunday Times (UK)


It is a gripping thriller, but it’s also about life and love: the love of an exasperated daughter for her mother; the love of sisters and of friends and the love I felt for Maud.
Independent (UK)


A compelling read, Elizabeth is Missing offers added depth of mystery and suspense along with aptly portraying a family trying to cope with illness.
New York Journal of Books


British author Healey draws on her own grandmothers’ experiences…. Few readers may want to journey through the mind of a person with dementia, but Healey demonstrates that an absorbing tale can indeed be written from such a perspective.
Publishers Weekly


(Starred review.) Delving into the mind of a woman suffering from dementia, Healey uses her unreliable narrator to create realistic tension. Suspenseful and emotional in equal parts, the author's debut hits all the right notes. —Jane Jorgenson, Madison P.L., WI
Library Journal


(Starred review.) Part mystery, part meditation on memory, part Dickensian revelation of how apparent charity may hurt its recipients, this is altogether brilliant
Booklist


Maud's memory is failing, slipping further away each day. So how can she convince anyone that her best friend is truly missing?… A poignant novel of loss.
Kirkus Reviews