The book “The Leaving” by Tara Altebrando is an enthralling fiction story about six kids who go missing on their first day of kindergarten. After eleven years of no clues to where the children went, five of them mysteriously come back but have absolutely no memory of anything occurring in that period. Most of the children don’t remember the sixth kid who didn’t come back, Max, and they also don’t know why he didn’t return with the rest of the children. Avery, the sister of Max, is determined to find out what happened to her brother, but she isn’t prepared for what she finds.  

The book goes back and forth between three character’s point of view. The characters are two of the children who went missing, Lucus and Scarlett, and Avery, who shows how she is choosing to go about the search for her brother. 

The story goes about their search for answers to questions that everyone in town wants to know. The idea for this book is very interesting and the way the author went about telling this story is very good for the mystery tone of the story. She wrote it to make each chapter harder to put down. After one action scene, there is another clue that has been slowly building that becomes a big plot point in the story. 

It has very many twists, so it is good for readers who get bored easily of their reading. There’s almost never a slow point in the entire book, it’s all moving forward at every new page. The language she uses makes it much easier to understand because it is very clear and expressive at the same time.  

This book helped me get out of a reading slump. I think it is worth reading if you are interested in mystery books with slight romance in them. I enjoyed reading this book through to the end.