Title: Abandoned by Allison Brennan
Max Revere Series Book Five
Publisher: Minotaur Books
Genre: Contemporary, Mystery, Suspense
Length: 352 pages
Book Rating: B
Complimentary Review Copy Provided by Publisher Through NetGalley
Summary:
New York Times bestselling author Allison Brennan weaves the intimate, unputdownable story of an investigator confronting the most important–and most dangerous–mystery of her career.
Investigative reporter Max Revere has cracked many cases, but the one investigation she’s never attempted is the mystery from her own past. Her mother abandoned her when she was nine, sending her periodic postcards, but never returning to reclaim her daughter. Seven years after the postcards stop coming, Martha Revere is declared legally dead, with no sign of what may have happened to her. Until now.
With a single clue—that her mother’s car disappeared sixteen years ago in a small town on the Chesapeake Bay—Max drops everything to finally seek the truth. As Max investigates, and her mother’s story unfolds, she realizes that Martha teamed up with a con man. They traveled the world living off Martha’s trust and money they conned from others.
Though no one claims to know anything about Martha or her disappearance, Max suspects more than one person is lying. When she learns the FBI has an active investigation into the con man, Max knows she’s on the right path. But as Max digs into the dark secrets of this idyllic community, the only thing she might find is the same violent end as her mother.
Review:
The fifth installment in Allison Brennan’s Max Revere series, Abandoned is an intriguing mystery about a cold case that is has haunted Max for nearly twenty-two years. This latest release can be read as a standalone, but I highly recommend the previous novels in the series.
Investigative reporter Max Revere is taking time off from her cable show in order to concentrate on the cold case that she has never been able to crack: the inexplicable disappearance of her mother, Martha Revere. When Max was nine years old, Martha left her daughter with her grandparents and took off for parts unknown with her boyfriend, Jimmy Truman. Over the next six years, Max received a handful of postcards from Martha, but after her sixteenth birthday, she never heard from her mother again. With new information that puts Martha in a seaside town in Virginia around the time she stopped mailing postcards, Max makes finding out the truth about what happened to Martha a priority.
Max is rather tenacious as she tries to retrace Martha’s footsteps. She is quite methodical as she questions anyone who has even the slightest connection to the case. She is very thorough as she researches the time period when Martha was known to be in town. Max tries to temper her usual blunt approach when she questions Jimmy’s brother, Gabriel, but he rather forcefully shuts her down. After she discovers the FBI was looking into Jimmy, she teams up with FBI Agent Ryan Maguire to try to find out what happened to Martha and Jimmy who has vanished as well.
Unbeknownst to Max, her investigation is going to turn her life upside down. She has no idea what Jimmy and Martha were mixed up in, but readers get a front seat to their activities through a series of enlightening flashbacks. Max’s quest for answers sets in motion an unstoppable chain of events that will ultimately put Max and several other people in grave danger.
Abandoned is an evenly paced mystery with an interesting storyline and a cast of memorable characters. Max slowly but surely pieces together much of her missing mother’s life but will she find out for sure what happened to Martha? With stunning twists and shocking revelations, Allison Brennan brings the novel to an edge of the seat, dramatic conclusion. This newest addition is sure to be a hit with old and new fans of the Max Revere series.
