A Love Letter to Lisa Jewell

Dear Mrs. Jewell,

As they say on the cliche home-decor signs, I am “thankful, grateful and blessed” to have found your work so early on in my reading challenge. In fact, if it hadn’t been for the dollar amount associated with your most recent books, there was a moment when I considered making my list of books to read a replica of your list of books written but, alas, only four ultimately made it.

The first book of yours that I finished was Then She Was Gone. And, while I thought that I loved psychological thrillers before reading your work, I don’t think I truly knew what love was until I finished this book. Without the gore associated with novels like The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (you can’t close your eyes and read a book) or the horror associated with books like Sharp Objects, Then She Was Gone was a genre of psychological thriller I didn’t know existed, with a storyline that kept me guessing until the very end. It’s still the first book I recommend when asked and it will forever have a place at the top of my list– along with the next three of your books I read.

To be completely honest ( and please don’t let what I’m about to say make you think that anything I’ve already said is untrue) I’m not really a name-remembering kind of person. Singers, bands, authors– I’m just not great with names; so when The Family Upstairs was recommended to me, I didn’t automatically recognize the author. Until I sat down to read it and the beginning pages had the list of books you’ve written. I’m not going to lie, I had been a little skeptical at the summary, but when I realized you were the author, my skepticism melted away. Also, I was very thankful that I had kept Then She Was Gone so close to my heart because, after my realization, I was able to return the wonderful favor of recommending and lending books (which, besides discovering you, is one of the best things to come out of this book-reading adventure) to the same person who had lent me The Family Upstairs, knowing that she would enjoy it just as much as I had.

Another fun coincidence (or perhaps repercussion) that occurred after reading your books happened just a few days ago, it was WEEKS after finishing the third book of yours, Invisible Girl. Sitting with Shri in a rare moment of quiet, I found myself thinking about a girl. I couldn’t really see her but I could see her shadow climbing up buildings and looking into windows. I knew this girl and her story but I could not, for the life of me, figure out how. It was one of those moments where you find yourself wondering, “was it a movie I watched or a conversation I had–who was I talking to?” So I googled it. Didn’t even finish typing the whole sentence before Invisible Girl popped up and, with it, that small, rare moment of silence was lost. I launched into a summary of the novel in the same way that I recap the drama of my day, putting specific emphasis on the confidence with which I believed each twist and turn was the final outcome and how devastated I was when, a few pages later, I realized I had been duped yet again! Thankfully, that impromptu recap resulted in Shri gifting me one of my favorite Christmas presents and the final story of my sixty-book challenge–your newest release, The Night She Disappeared.
If it weren’t for those pesky holidays, I would have finished your book in two days– but alas, it took four. And, this, Mrs. Jewell, is the reason for my letter. Those four days were simultaneously the best and worst days. I loved you and I hated you (but in a good way) and mostly, I was dying to know how you do it. How do you write an almost 400-page story and keep the reader clinging on with every sentence? How do you create these characters that I care for and yet despise? How do you connect a reader to a character so aggressively that the reader puts down her Christmas turkey and thinks “I wonder how Kim is doing. I left her in kind of a tight spot”? I wanted the book to be over so badly because I needed to know what happened and then, as soon as it was, I desperately wished to read it again with fresh eyes.
After all you have done to write these stories, I feel like the least I can do is say, “Thank you, Mrs. Jewell. I am thankful for your writing, grateful to still have so many books left to read and blessed to know that there will be more to come.”

Love,

Bailey