e-Audio, 05:52:21
Narrated by: Amy Hall
Release Date: October 15, 2024
Published by: HarperAudio
Read from: October 21-22, 2024
Stand-alone
Source: PRH Audio App (I got an e-Audio from the publisher and their audio app. This did nothing to influence my review.
Content Warning: Animal Cruelty, Child Abuse, Animal Death, Bullying, Racism, Violence, Cultural Appropriation, Abandonment
For Readers Interested In: Middle Grade, Mystery, Racial/Ethnic Diversity (Indigenous- Cherokee), Own Voices, Family Diversity (Mom is Missing, Grandma loves with them)Five years, three months, and twelve days.
That’s how long Wren’s mother has been missing.
In dreams, Wren can see her again: her eyes, her hair, her smile. She can even hear her laugh. Her mother, one of hundreds of Native Americans considered missing or murdered in Oklahoma. Sometimes it seems like Wren and her grandmother are the only people still looking. Even more frustrating, Wren’s overprotective father won’t talk about it.
Wren refuses to give up, though. And an opportunity to find lost pets seems like a real way to hone her detective skills. But everything changes when one of the missing pets is found badly hurt. Soon, there are others.
With help from an unlikely friend, Wren vows to unmask whoever is behind the animal abuse. If she can do this, maybe she can do the same for her mother’s case. She’ll just have to keep it secret from her father who will certainly put an end to all her sleuthing if he finds out.
Find Her explores the crisis of missing Indigenous women from the perspective of a sensitive young Cherokee girl who yearns to find her mother, while also navigating a chilling town mystery, a new friendship, and a family in need of healing.
*MY THOUGHTS*
I swear I say this with every book, but as soon as I saw this cover I knew it needed to be mine. This image is so striking and pulled me in immediately. The illustrator did an amazing job, because this was definitely one of the ones that I added it to my TBR without knowing anything else about it lol
So in this we meet the main character, Wren. She’s been on the counting the days since her mother’s gone missing. She’s one of the many Native women missing where she’s from. With so many of them missing, Wren doesn’t feel like enough is being done… Which makes the fact that her dad is a cop even more frustrating.
But, Wren actually has a knack for finding pets, so she thinks she might be able to assist with her mother’s case. But in the midst of looking into that case, she walks right into another. Someone is hurting animals. She makes a friend and they work together to try finding the person hurting the animals as well as her mom. This of course is just asking for trouble. And of course it finds her. In many different ways. I was actually pretty surprised at the way it presents itself too.
Her friend was actually part of the trouble. I thought it was handled in a pretty decent way, although I do wish it had went into a little more detail into what was going on at the friend’s house. I felt really bad for the friend and I wanted to see in detail what happened after they got help. It would have helped to know the process of things like that for kids.
The ending was really good tho. It could be used in two different ways and I enjoyed that. On the one hand it can leave it open for another. On the other hand it, left things like reality does, with no answers. I love that this book is a MG book talking about the MMIP. I hate when people say kids are too young for something. If they already know its happening, how are you REALLY keeping it from them?
The characters in this kind of worked my nerves, but I was more happy with them as they began to show that they were including her more. This was her way of grieving her too. She was keeping herself busy and had some pretty real realizations because she was able to process her feelings through doing things. HOWEVER, the way that she was running around and getting into all this trouble like that, I don’t understand how there was no reprimanding?! She kept telling all these adults what she was doing, “for a good cause” and everyone was so accepting. If I had done that I would have gotten into a world of trouble.
This was a book I don’t think I’ll ever forget. Tho i had a few tiny issues, for the most part I really enjoyed my read of this. I hope this review will help to tie more people to this book.
Overall, I give this
