The Vanishing Season
Written by Jodi Lynn Anderson
Narrated by Cassandra Campbell
3.5/5
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About this audiobook
From New York Times bestselling author Jodi Lynn Anderson comes a haunting and lovely small-town romance, perfect for fans of Gayle Forman, Lauren Myracle, and Laurie Halse Anderson.
When Maggie’s parents move them from bustling Chicago to small, rundown Door County, Wisconsin, she thinks she’ll spend a year reading classics and killing time until college.
That plan changes as soon as she meets Pauline and Liam. Soon the three are inseparable, stretching out the love between two childhood best friends to fit over all of them and all their grand dreams.
But what starts as an uneventful year suddenly changes. Someone is killing teenage girls, and the town reels from each new tragedy. And as the dynamics between Maggie, Pauline, and Liam shift and collide in irreversible ways, they all will experience love and loss hand-in-hand—but only two of them will survive the winter.
Jodi Lynn Anderson
Jodi Lynn Anderson is the bestselling author of several critically acclaimed books for young people, including the May Bird trilogy, the Thirteen Witches series, and My Diary from the Edge of the World. She lives with her husband, son, and daughter in Asheville, North Carolina, and holds an MFA in writing and literature from Bennington College.
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Reviews for The Vanishing Season
20 ratings11 reviews
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5A ghost bears witness to a friendship falling apart in the wake of a series of murders in the area surrounding a small town.Maggie's family falls on hard times and moves from Chicago to the farmhouse they inherited. The small town lies along the shores of Lake Michigan. Pauline, the beautiful girl next door, takes Maggie under her wing. She and Liam have known each other since they were small children, and now Maggie completes the trio. But when a series of murders in nearby towns frightens Pauline's mother, she sends Pauline away. Liam and Maggie find themselves filling the vacuum that Pauline leaves with each other.A ghostly voice interrupts the action to comment. The trapped spirit is frustrated that it cannot warn the players in this drama. Without form or voice, the spirit can only witness and comment.Maggie was very real to me. She felt as anyone would who gets thrown into a new situation: like an interloper. She knew the moment she met Liam that he and Pauline were meant to be together, yet she couldn't help feeling drawn to him. She took her chance, a chance that Pauline was always too afraid to take, despite her bravado. Both girls had time away from their homes, and both learned something about themselves. That's what makes the ending so heartbreaking and hopeful at the same time.
- Rating: 2 out of 5 stars2/5I picked this because I liked the author's previous book, Tiger Lily. However, even though I gave this one a good chance, I never could get into it or relate to the characters very well.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5I picked up this book partly because I had just finished a different book with a similar title, and because I was intrigued by the mixed reviews I saw for it, but I ended up really liking it!
The story has elements of young adult coming of age novels, ghost stories, mystery, and romance, and everything came together in a way that really worked for me. The whole book has a kind of nebulous feel and had some beautiful writing that I really enjoyed. I think I read this book at the right time of year as well, just as winter cold was creeping up and getting ready to stay. - Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Vanishing Season is my entree into Jodi Lynn Anderson and VanishingSeasonI had no idea what to expect, other than it got great reviews. I thought it was more mystery, knowing that young girls were vanishing and being found weeks later, floating face down in a lake. But it was far from a mystery. It is a book about growing up, about relationships, about love.Financial reversals force Maggie and her family move from their high-rise Chicago apartment to a ramshackle house in Gill Creek, Wisconsin that they inherited. Her next door neighbor is a beautiful girl her age, Pauline Boden and she and a boy their age, Liam Witte have been friends since they were young. While love is there, it’s not followed through because Pauline’s mother thinks Liam is beneath them, partly because his father is a little ‘odd’. Maggie, Pauline and Liam become an inseparable threesome.Around the time of Maggie’s move, teenage girls start disappearing and winding up floating face down in the lake. After Liam and Pauline come home late for curfew one night and her mother, worried to death, has called the police, Pauline is banished to her aunt’s house in Milwaukee until the killer is found.I’m pretty sure you can guess what happens…to some extent. Because the ending was a surprise to me…but then again, I’m not all that good about guessing endings.I know the likeability (is that a word?) of characters shouldn’t influence whether or not you like a book, but it does with me and I really liked all the characters in the book, especially Pauline who is a free spirit. (I love free spirit maybe because I wish I was one.) I liked the way Anderson described the location, the characters, the entire setting. She added an element of suspense and also the supernatural, which added to the story, while not overpowering it.The Vanishing Season is a good story. After having bagged the last three out of four books I’ve read, I was thrilled to read one that kept me going.
- Rating: 2 out of 5 stars2/5I expected more suspense around the serial murders. The ending was disappointing.
- Rating: 1 out of 5 stars1/5I read Tiger Lily but this author and just absolutely fell in love with that book. So I know this author can write and weave a great story. I was looking forward to reading this book. It sounded haunting in a ghost like type of story but I was curious how it would all play out. Sadly, I could not wait to see how the story would all play out in the end. This is because the story was painstakingly long and drawn out. It was only after I was about a third of the way in that I realized just how slow and that this was the pacing for the whole book. I could not go any further and put the book down. There was not much happening for me to grab onto to stick with the book. The three characters or love triangle just meshed together like a dream swirl. Which in essence the characters were uninteresting to me.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5This is the first book I've read by Jodi Lynn Anderson -- an author who has definitely established a foothold in contemporary YA. And what I loved about this book -- aside from its authenticity, the so-real-you-can-see-your-breath-in-the-cold setting, the striking voice -- was that it bends the rules of contemporary YA. And it bends them kind of hard. And it works.THE VANISHING SEASON takes place in rural Wisconsin. And by Rural I mean there's no cell reception, everyone knows everyone, and everyone is part of a population that is maybe three digits. Maggie, the protagonist, lives on a street where she only has two neighbors -- beautiful Pauline and her hot, male, friend-zoned bestie, Liam. Each of Maggie's new friends comes with some serious baggage. Pauline's rich family was left devastated after the death of her father, and Liam's dad is the town Atheist. Maggie misses Chicago, but she lets herself fall into these new friendships, spending all of her time with Pauline and Liam when she's not working on her homeschooling or at the town's antique dealer, where she's employed by the most gossipy woman she's ever met.But even in the beautiful setting of Door County, on this gorgeous lake, Maggie's idyllic small town is shattered by the news of missing -- and dead -- girls. The events shake up everyone. Maggie's boss has a list of suspects (pretty much everyone), but it doesn't make anyone feel safer. If anything, it gives folks a bit of a sick thrill. And another unnamed narrator -- that of a long gone girl -- is there to watch it all unfold.This book is beautiful and strange and impossible to put down. With both elements of mystery and the first sparks of romance, THE VANISHING SEASON is the kind of book that leaves readers breathless. I can't wait to see what Jodi Lynn Anderson does next.
- Rating: 2 out of 5 stars2/5I will give that the writing is beautiful, but publishers, you really do yourselves no favors when you use such misleading synopsis. Full review to come.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Maggie moves to Door County when her mother loses her job in Chicago. They now live in a summer bungalow on the lake next to a rather eccentric girl named Pauline. The only other teen living near them is Liam who has been in love with Pauline his while life. Unfortunately, it takes Pauline too long to realize how she feels about him, and Maggie gets hurt in the process. However, in an incredible act of loyalty and courage, Maggie saves Pauline. This is their story. The end ties it all together in a way I did not anticipate, making it a great ghost story.
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5After Maggie's mom loses her bank job in Chicago, the family moves to a beautiful, but rundown house in Door County, Wisconsin, overlooking Lake Michigan. It's a very remote area and the town is small. One of the first things Maggie notices is a complete lack of cell service, another cut between herself and the life she had to leave behind. Since she's home schooled, opportunities to meet other teens are pretty limited. She begins to wonder about the strange girl she sees who lives next door and about the hammering she hears off in the woods.When she meets Pauline, the girl she's been watching, they begin a tentative friendship. Pauline's dad died of a heart attack while fishing on the lake and her mom seems frozen in time as a result. Pauline is a bit odd, but Maggie warms to her, partly because she is different. The mysterious hammering turns out to be Liam, the boy whose mom left years ago and whose dad is a local pariah because of his athiestic behavior. Liam's building a sauna so Pauline can have a warm place during the winter.When girls begin dying and are found in the lake, everyone becomes frightened and circle the wagons. This brings Pauline, Maggie and Liam closer. Liam has loved Pauline since they were very little, but she's unable to reciprocate, mostly because her mother wouldn't approve. When Pauline is sent away until the killer is caught, Liam and Maggie fall in love, but upon Pauline's return, she takes him away from Maggie, who pretty much gives up feeling anything.Interspersed with the action are stream of consciousness observations by a ghost, whose identity isn't revealed until the very sad and unsettling ending. While reviews of this book are all over the scale, I liked it, but found it terribly sad. I suspect teen readers will also have mixed feelings about it.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5This story begins when Maggie Larsen moves to the town of Gill Creek with her parents. They have come from Chicago because Mrs. Larsen has found a job. They are downsizing their lives because of changing economic times. Maggie is an only child who is being home-schooled by her unemployed dad. Maggie is quiet, thoughtful, and the type of kid who looks many times before she leaps.The first person she meets is Pauline who is a unique free-spirit. She also meets Pauline's friend Liam. Pauline and Liam have grown up together and have a unique relationship. Liam is in love with Pauline who insistst that she doesn't see him that way. The three of them are the only ones living close in a rural area. They become friends. When a killer starts targeting girls in the area, concern rises. Pauline is sent away to live with an aunt. Liam and Maggie begin a romance - a first for Maggie. But then Pauline comes back.Interspersed in this story is another story told by a ghost. It takes until the end of the story to find out who the ghost it. I enjoyed this story. I liked the practical, pragmatic Maggie. I enjoyed watching the friendships and the romance grow. I was sad when it ended. Fans of romantic stories with ghosts will enjoy this one.