Missing White Woman – Kellye Garrett

The truth is never skin deep.

It was supposed to be a romantic getaway weekend in New York City. Breanna’s new boyfriend, Ty, took care of everything—the train tickets, the dinner reservations, the rented four-story luxury rowhouse in Jersey City with a beautiful view of the Manhattan skyline.

But when Bree comes downstairs their final morning, Ty is nowhere to be found and there’s a stranger dead in the foyer—the missing woman the entire Internet has become obsessed Janelle Beckett. Soon, both the police and an army of Internet sleuths are asking questions Bree doesn’t know how to answer. Desperate to find Ty and to keep her own secrets buried, Bree realizes there’s only one person she can turn her ex-best friend, a lawyer with whom she shares a very complicated past. 

Fierce, smart, and thrilling to the end, Missing White Woman not only explores “Missing White Woman” syndrome and traveling while Black, but deftly inverts the hallmarks of the domestic suspense genre to How well can we truly know the people we love? And what happens to these stories when seen through the eyes of a Black woman?

Book Info: Print length 333 pages. Publisher: Simon & Schuster UK. Publication Date: 9 May 2024

My Thoughts:

This book has been on my radar for a while, but it wasn’t until I saw Kellye Garrett speak at Capital Crime London at the end of May that I moved it up my TBR pile.

Missing White Woman is a fresh and compelling take on the “missing persons” story told through the voice of Breanna (Bree). She’s looking forward to a romantic weekend away with her boyfriend Ty. They’ve been together for a few months and he’s arranged a fabulous Airbnb in New Jersey which he will meet her at on the Friday evening as he is working in the city that week.

The weekend, however is not quite the romantic getaway Bree hoped for, as Ty is distracted by work and constantly on his phone dealing with a new client. Wanting to make up for their botched weekend, they both agree to take the Monday off work and spend the day together, however when Bree wakes up she finds Ty gone and a dead woman lying at the bottom of the stairs.

As the main narrator, Bree is an interesting character. She has a dodgy past, more is revealed throughout the story, a troubled and dysfunctional relationship with her mother and has a very complicated history with her ex-best friend. She’s desperate to believe her boyfriend had nothing to do with the dead white woman, but all the evidence points his way.

Missing White Woman is a powerful and often uncomfortable look at the difficulties and prejudices faced by people of colour in today’s society. It also takes a brutal look at the power of social media, trial by public and the dangers of the internet.

Overall whilst some people have classed this as a slow-burner, I thought it was very clever, very twisted, thought-provoking with a couple of OMG twists that I certainly didn’t see coming.

Rating: 4 out of 5.