“The Weight of Silence” by Heather Gudenkauf
Omigod, you guys.
There should really be a label put on books that indicates they shouldn’t be read by anxious new parents. Painting a vivid, detail-by-detail portrait of a parent’s worst nightmare “The Weight of Silence” is one of those books.
Seven-year-old Calli and Petra are best friends who live in a nice town. One morning, their respective parents wake up to find both little girls missing. With this moment, the book takes off like a rocket, spinning through the narratives of a variety of people closest to the girls in the hours to follow – Calli’s Mom and Brother, Petra’s Dad, and a Detective. What happened to the girls? Were they taken? Who took them – was it Calli’s Dad, her brother? Was it the Guidance Counselor Calli’s been working with? Was it a teenage friend of Petra’s family? As a reader, you can barely breathe as the minutes and hours tick by and the mysteries and knots tying all these people together untangle.
Seriously, this is a fast and thrilling read.
As a new mom, it terrified me.
Ah, the power of literature.
Posted on June 11, 2012, in Uncategorized and tagged fiction. Bookmark the permalink. 1 Comment.
I agree. A great read and as a parent it creates nightmares. For me it was even more then that because my daughter had selective mutism for two years. Thankfully she is better now but I read it when she was mute.