Lilibet Bombshell's Reviews > College Girl, Missing: The True Story of How a Young Woman Disappeared in Plain Sight

I was initially skeptical about reading and reviewing this book because the central victim involved is another All-American girl and it’s written by a man who’s worked for two media outlets I completely despise (the New York Post and The Daily Mail). What made me change my mind is the fact that I’m always intrigued by the stories of disappearances that just don’t make any sense. So many people saw Lauren Spierer the night she disappeared. She was seen in multiple locations and on multiple cameras. There just happened to be no cameras in the last place she actually might have been, and then it was a handful of rich college boys who were all in that same spot and had enough time to cover their butts before anyone came after them with questions about what happened that night.

I would’ve been really into this book if I felt it wasn’t anything but a waste of everyone’s time, in the long run. It’s not that Cohen is a bad writer, it’s just that all the new “testimony” that Cohen collected isn’t really testimony: it’s more like anecdotes from friends, potential witnesses, and some of the potential suspects. None of this comes into play until far into the back half of the book.

Otherwise, the book feels rather repetitive, somewhat exploitative, and more than a little tawdry. I feel like there were some discussion topics that could’ve been explored here that would’ve contributed well to the book and to who Lauren was as a person but maybe weren’t approached, possibly out of courtesy to the Spierer family, but if you want to paint a portrait of a college girl gone missing, you should paint a complete one.

I was provided a copy of this title by NetGalley and the author. All thoughts, opinions, views, and ideas expressed herein are mine and mine alone. This review is rated three stars or under, which means it will not be appearing on my social media pages. Thank you.

File Under: Nonfiction/True Crime