I cannot put this book down. After reading the second part of the novel I can’t help but wonder where it is going.

I really enjoy how this book is out of chronological order. Most of my favorite, and many of the best movies are shot this way, and I feel this is the reason that I am really glued to the pages. Vida sets us up kind of in the middle of the action. But it’s the middle of the action at two separate points in time: with her fiancé and while on the train. I am really enjoying how she slowly fills in the back-story as the present time rolls on in every other chapter. She is leaving me trying to piece things together and always wondering what’s next.

The background about her mother leaving and how she coped with it is an essential element in her character. The ability to just pick up and leave is in her blood. Her mom did it. She did it looking for her mother. It just seemed too easy. It was one of those things that just didn’t really sit well with me. I could not do that. I guess that is a gap. I have never had anyone run out on me, and I have never done it to someone else. Therefore I cannot fathom what it would feel like or how I would cope. Another thing that is just kind of eating at me was the story of her mother kissing the drunk. The author just kind of slides that in there without any real explanation. It leaves me to wonder why exactly the mother was so unhappy and so compelled to leave.

Frankly I could not believe she found her father so quickly. I thought that the journey for her father would drag out much longer than it did. I felt that the author was going to take the book in a completely different direction. My guess would have been that she finds her father late in the book after failing in the first town she tries. Then she would finally track him down and gain some vital piece of information about her mother. This info would be basically useless to the father but would help Clarissa piece everything together and find out where her mother disappeared. And now that I know that isn’t really the case, I cannot help but wonder, where is this going?