this cover got me immediately. this is my sign with my bestest friend! and has been for 33 years. so i had to read this. luckily non of us have asked the other to birth our child so it was a step away from me not to be too freaked out,lol.
Lexi and her best friend Mara drifted apart after a tragic incident in middle school. but over a decade later and they are bought together by another desperate moment. Mara has had to flee her abusive marriage. Lexi is having her own troubles within her marriage and so when Mara then offers to be her surrogate it could be the answer to all their prayers. but just before the due date of her baby Mara vanishes. and it is then that Lexi starts a desperate race to find her. but she will end up finding way more than she thought as secrets resurface and are found out making Lexi now question who Mara really is and whether she truly knew her at all.
my heart was quickening with each page and especially on the new reveals in this book. its taught and fraught with those the need of a mother and friend to find out more, to find her child. this mother in Lexi is already there and you can feel with her whole heart how she will already do anything for her child. is gives her that otherworldly strength of a mother.
i was hooked all the way through and it had both my heart for the race but also my heart for the emotional hits too.
Danielle manages to set out a layered and balanced book that feels like you get enough pull for each part of the book. we are told through past and present just whats going on and who these people are and there is no let up in me as a readers need to turn pages and pages and pages. until in the end i gave up kidding myself of "just one more page" and i let myself acknowledge there was on way i was putting this book down until i knew exactly how this was going to end.
a brilliant read, so smart and clever with the balance between tension and emotional moments mixed together brilliantly.