*We received this book in exchange for an honest review.*
Missing Clarissa is advertised as perfect for fans of A Good Girl’s Guide to Murder. In 1999, popular cheerleader Clarissa Campbell disappears at a party in the woods the summer before her senior year of high school. No one ever found out what happened to Clarissa.
Fast forward 20 years and best friends Blair Johnson and Cameron Munoz start a true crime podcast. But it turns out, their podcast might have helped the killer more than the victim. The killer knows that two high school girls are seeking the truth, but remains determined to keep Clarissa’s story a secret.
Through interviews and the investigation, Blair and Cameron know someone isn’t telling the truth and the secret of Clarissa’s disappearance is not what anyone will expect. Secrets can’t stay hidden forever in this small town.
We requested Missing Clarissa because the plot sounded amazing. We’re happy to say it was done well. The investigation started with a podcast done for a school project and lead Blair and Cameron through a messy web of secrets. Jones did a good job of introducing suspects and surprising the characters at the end with the reveal.
The sad part is that this book could have been excellent, but fell plat with the writing style and the third person point of view. The sentence structure felt too choppy at times as well. All of these reasons made it hard to connect with the characters. When we read thrillers and mysteries, we want to feel anxious for the characters and be in suspense, which we couldn’t do with this story.
Blair’s and Cameron’s thoughts were run together without the separation of a paragraph or page break. If Blair and Cameron each got their own chapters with an alternating dual POV, it would have been much better. But again, some authors can’t make third person work because the readers won’t connect to the characters. It can be done well, but it’s tricky.
Overall, we loved the murder mystery and true crime podcast of the story. The execution and writing style fell flat for us.
Rating: ⭐⭐⭐/⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐
I'm All Booked Up - a young adult book blog 
I don’t see the two of you differ in your ratings of a book very often! It does sound like an interesting premise though and I’m glad you enjoyed it.
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Thank you! Sorry for the confusion, our ratings mean three out of a possible five stars.
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I love the true crime podcast trope. It’s too bad it didn’t live up to your expectations.
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We loved the idea of two students starting a true crime podcast.
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This sounds like a great story and I love the cover of this book, but it’s unfortunate that it fell flat. Connecting with the characters is so important and I also like to be on the edge of my seat with suspense with mystery and thrillers. Thank you for sharing your honest review!
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Thanks for reading!! Missing Clarissa would be a very different book if the characters were given a chance to shine.
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i love the use of true crime podcasts. i’ll be adding this to my tbr.
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We hope you enjoy it!
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Shame for the writing style, I always find multiple POV actually better to understand mor of the plot. It sounded like an interesting plot!
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We usually enjoy multiple POVs, but this author didn’t separate POVs base don chapter, They sort of ran together.
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This is a great post, and this sounds like an interesting read. Thank you for sharing!
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Thanks for reading!
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You’re welcome!
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Sounds like a cool book to read. The storyline sounds very intriguing. It makes me wonder what actually happened to Clarissa. Thank you for sharing.
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Thank you! That part was very interesting.
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Sorry this one didn’t live up to expectations! Choppy writing is a hard thing to get past
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It distracted from the plot and made it hard to connect with the characters.
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I haven’t heard of this book before, it is shame it didn’t give you what you expected. This isn’t my usual go-to but thank you for sharing your honest thoughts!
Lauren.
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