Book Review: Missing Pieces by Heather Gudenkauf

MISSING PIECES

By: Heather Gudenkauf

Published: February 2, 2016

Publisher: MIRA

Fiction/Mystery/Suspense

Heather Gudenkauf is an Iowa author and sets her mysteries in small towns across Iowa. In her newest mystery, Sarah and Jack return to Penny Gate, Iowa from their home in Colorado. Jack’s aunt, Julia, has had a fall and is now in a coma. Jack is forced to return home to the aunt he loves like a mother and to the place that is full of nightmares he has tried to forget. Sarah, his wife, has been kept in the dark about Jack’s family history and finds herself in a frenzy of unanswered questions and maybe the next wife in Jack’s family to find herself in danger.

I read this novel on a long bus ride to Canada last month and it was the perfect pace and length to keep me interested and make the drive pass by. I love that Gudenkauf sets her novels in Iowa, because I always feel like I can identify with the characters and locations she describes. Penny Gate sounds like the small town in Iowa live in.

 I think my main issue with this novel is I didn’t like the characters as much. I understood that Sarah was upset when she found out her husband had kept secrets from her about his past. But, I thought she was a bit too childish and nosy to make her character believable. There were too many situations in the novel that fell into place too easily or had too much of a coincidence.

Even with those drawbacks, it still held my interest and kept me guessing as to who might be the murderer. Gudenkauf can tell a twisted story along with sharing the beautiful countryside of small town Iowa. She gives readers a glimpse into our lives…..with a murder or two thrown in. Her books make for quick reads and will fill your murder mystery need. I just may have to avoid going down into my parents’ cellar at their farmhouse for awhile.

Heather Gudenkauf – source

I love promoting Iowa authors and I feel like if I ran into Heather, we’d be fast friends!