The Vanishing Season

Having been a big fan of the May Bird Trilogy by author Jodi Lynn Anderson, my expectations had been set high for The Vanishing Point. However, this book was just lukewarm, had a feeble plot, and was too predictable from beginning to end. While the premise of the story is told in third person and in fractioned tidbits of a female ghost just observing the world around her, which sounds like it could lead to some very strong writing, it just didn’t happen. If the story had been told solely from the ghost’s perspective, which in itself was phenomenally written, it could have pulled the entire storyline in a new direction. However, a book needs a bit more context than this, and just didn’t deliver.

What Anderson does have going for readers is her beautiful gift for character creation. She can make any character or creature come alive with unmistakable realism and this, for many readers like myself, is enough to remain engaged with the book until the end. This is a book you will either love or hate, and if you can easily find enjoyment in characters alone, you will truly love this book.