If You Find Me: Summary and book reviews of If You Find Me by Emily Murdoch, plus links to an excerpt from If You Find Me and a biography of Emily Murdoch.
If You Find Me
by Emily Murdoch
Hardcover: Mar 2013,
256 pages.
A broken-down camper hidden deep in a national forest is the only home fifteen year-old Carey can remember. The trees keep guard over her threadbare existence, with the one bright spot being Carey's younger sister, Jenessa, who depends on Carey for her very survival. All they have is each other, as their mentally ill mother comes and goes with greater frequency. Until that one fateful day their mother disappears for good, and two strangers arrive. Suddenly, the girls are taken from the woods and thrust into a bright and perplexing new world of high school, clothes and boys.
Now, Carey must face the truth of why her mother abducted her ten years ago, while haunted by a past that won't let her go… a dark past that hides many a secret, including the reason Jenessa hasn't spoken a word in over a year. Carey knows she must keep her sister close, and her secrets even closer, or risk watching her new life come crashing down.
Emily Murdock has created her protagonist as a survivor – fierce, proud, and tender. Carey is incredibly resilient given what she's been through. Readers will cry with her, root for her, follow her to the terrible center of the dark secret she must confront before she can truly begin her life again. (Reviewed by Sharry Wright).
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Media Reviews
Publishers Weekly
Carey's model-level beauty and virtuosity as a violinist, [make] the novel's sense of realism take a hit. That said, Carey and Nessa's story is memorable and deeply moving, and readers will find it very easy to fall in love with these girls. Ages 12–up.
Booklist
Starred Review. First-time author Emily Murdoch has written a painful, hopeful, surprisingly quiet book that charts the best and worst of humanity, especially family, with characters who worm their way into your heart - or repulse the reader's very nature.
Kirkus Reviews
Starred Review. A compelling narrative that is both unflinching about life's pain and hopeful about its possibilities.
School Library Journal
Starred Review. Beautifully written. The deep bond between the sisters is almost physically palpable, as is their intense longing for love and acceptance; they will quickly endear themselves to readers.
Jennifer Brown, author of Hate List
Within two pages, I was so hopelessly hooked, I felt like the story had attached itself to me. The storyline is original and suspenseful, but most of all, it was Carey’s voice that had me flipping the pages. This is one of those books you devour.
Carol Lynch Williams, author of The Chosen One If You Find Me grabbed me by the heart on page one and didn't let go till the very last word. Murdoch's language is lovely, her storytelling gripping
Jenny Downham, author of Before I Die
“Searing . . . hurt my heart and will probably haunt my ;dreams – a beautiful book about survival, identity, family, love and so much more.
Recent Reader Reviews
Rated of 5
by Diane S. If you find me This debut novel, written for the young adult genre, is a very compelling and poignant novel. The heroine is a very strong but bruised, physically and mentally, character who is not a vampire or shape-shifter, or a fallen angel. In fact, that it is... Read More
According to the U.S Dept of Justice's Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention, about 200,000 children are reported missing each year as a result of parental abduction. 53% of family abducted children were gone less than a week, and 21% for more than a month.
In many parts of the U.S. there is uncertainty about how to handle this crime. If parents have not established an official custodial agreement, the state's child abduction laws do not always recognize parental child abduction as an official crime or take into consideration the danger it presents to the abducted child. In fact, it would appear that, only in California and Texas, is parental child abduction clearly categorized as a criminal offense.
In her report, Parental Child Abduction is Child Abuse, presented to the United Nations Convention on Child Rights, Nancy Faulkner, Ph.D. demonstrates how parental child abduction is essentially child abuse, often leaving deep scars on both the child and the family left behind. She documents how children abducted by a parent often...
Told in the inventive, funny, and poignant voice of Jack, Room is a celebration of resilience - and a powerful story of a mother and son whose love lets them survive the impossible.
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Jennifer Brown, author of Hate List
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by Diane S.
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