I adore Holly Jackson’s work so as soon as I heard about a new standalone book, I knew I had expectations in the stratosphere. The Reappearance of Rachel Price was one of my most anticipated titles of 2024, so read on to hear if it lived up to my hopes. A huge thank you to Madeline Adeane at Farshore for making my year and sending me an ARC in exchange for my honest review.

This review originally appeared on The Nerd Daily.

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Publication Date: 2nd April
TW: disappearance, PTSD, gaslighting, manipulation, abuse, flashbacks, forced captivity, stalking, kidnapping, murder, attempted murder, dementia

Goodreads | Waterstones

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My Thoughts:

The Reappearance of Rachel Price delivers another stunner of a Young Adult mystery from a mastermind of the genre. 

Holly Jackson has absolutely smashed it again. It’s no secret that I adore her books, having previously covered the A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder series and standalone novel Five Survive. Her mysteries are tightly woven with compelling characters and twists that are smart, unforgettable and really pack a punch. The Reappearance of Rachel Price leans into that true crime style narrative, while undermining its more generalised tendencies to really hone in on the characters involved at the centre of the case. Expect devastating twists and turns that hit that much harder because of how invested you have become in these characters. 

Jackson has done something so smart with this style of narrative. It is almost uncomfortably close to the characters, making you feel like a fly on the wall or a viewer of the very documentary being made. It makes you complicit in the exploitation Bel feels and the way a tragedy in her life that she cannot even remember has been turned into a bingeable mystery and obsession. She’s a constant object of interest for people who have no idea about her, turning her life into a salacious story that they can theorise about and transforming real people into the true crime caricatures we can expect to see. As a reader, you feel so strongly for Bel, but you are also eager to devour this book and uncover all the secrets yourself. You theorise, you discuss and you dissect. All of this intensifies tenfold with the titular reappearance. This is where an already layered narrative around the impact of trauma, grief and familial relationships gets that much deeper and twisted. There are reveals that I never saw coming, but it always remains grounded and character focused. You share Bel’s sense of paranoia and extreme uprooting as her entire world shifts and changes multiple times. Everything is questioned and as Bel was too young to remember this period of her life, you rediscover it alongside her. She’s a complex and sometimes morally gray character. Her snark and sarcasm is a well built defence mechanism, but beneath it there is a lonely child scared of abandonment. 

This is very much a book focused on family and the entangled, sometimes messy relationships within that space. There is one particularly excruciating scene with a family dinner that just reveals so much about everyone involved and takes on a new light after the final few chapters. It is just such a well crafted book that I already know will hold up to multiple rereads, with something new to notice each time. Jackson has always been a detail orientated writer but this shows a clear evolution of her writing style. A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder got dark, but you felt like Pip was a guiding hand and beam of light through it all (mostly). This feels murkier and more inclined to spiral at any given moment. It constantly centres around manipulation and that causes you to question everything you are presented with. There is such an excellent passage around gaslighting and abuse that just reframes the entire book in such a sickening way. Jackson has made subtle but devastating moves throughout that only come into the light at that moment. It is masterfully plotted and brilliantly executed. The ground never feels stable beneath your feet. It is a book concerned with the ambiguity of the truth, particularly in a true crime narrative. That final third of the book was a wild rollercoaster to read and it often felt like my heart was in my mouth as reveal after reveal poured out on to the page. It was dark, twisty and incredible. 

The Reappearance of Rachel Price is the YA thriller of the year so far for me. It is a lit fuse that explodes in dramatic fashion, but also always stays focused on the characters at its heart. This is a twisty, ambiguous book that thrives in its entangled relationships, unpicking the secrets hidden within.