"The Missing Half" | Reviewed by Chris Stuckenschneider

Two women band together to find their sisters in “The Missing Half” a well written who-dun-it by Ashley Flowers with strong believable characters and plenty of plot twists to keep readers guessing.

Nicole “Nic” Monroe is a train wreck. For the past seven years she’s been haunted by the loss of her older sister Kelsey who went missing when Nic was still in high school. Kelsey’s car was found deserted on a country road in small-town Indiana. Nic works in a dead end job at Funland, where rambunctious kids flock for birthday parties. She has few friends and continues to drink even though court orders demand she attend AA meetings and commit to community service—this after she crashed her car into a tree, got a DUI and lost her license.

Nic’s life changes one evening at Funland when a stranger approaches her on the parking at closing time. The woman says she wants to talk to Nic and mentions Kelsey’s name, which infuriates Nic. For years, she’s been dogged by reporters and a curious public wanting information about Kelsy, her only sibling, and her heart of hearts.

As Nic turns to walk away, she stops in her tracks when the woman exclaims: “My sister disappeared too. Just like Kelsey.”

The stranger is Jenna Connor. Her missing sister’s name is Jules. Frustrated because detectives have hit dead ends with both of the cases, Jenna pleads with Nic to join her in an investigation to discover what happened to the women known as the “Missing Mishawaka Girls.” So begins a relationship that evolves between Nic and Jenna, their mission to undercover facts about what happened to their sisters becoming a driving force in their day-to-day lives.

As the two women focus all their energy on their investigation, they become convinced that their sisters must have had a common acquaintance. Their search puts them in places with seemingly dangerous people who could do Nic and Jenna harm, as the story casts suspicions taking readers down one road then another before the shocking conclusion.

“The Missing Half” is a creative mystery certain to confound the cleverest of sleuths. It’s a satisfying read that never dips into gore or gratuitous sex to tells its story. Instead, readers get to know Nic and Jen through their back stories and in a friendship that develops through their shared cause.

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