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Sometimes, at night, he’s out there. . .
Thirteen-year-old Lizzie Hood lives next door to her best friend, Evie Verver. They share everything. All of their secrets belong to each other. Or so Lizzie thought. Now, with Evie gone, she’s not so sure.
On a mild afternoon, Evie vanishes from the school grounds, leaving a community in shock and a devastated family behind. Rumors and speculations grace everyone’s lips, but no one knows what truly happened to Evie—or if she will even be found. Yet Lizzie knows more than the others—even more than she thinks she might.
Strange dreams about her friend’s disappearance haunt Lizzie nightly. As she watches the Verver family slowly fall apart, she tries to help as best she can. But something feels wrong—a dreadful feeling in the pit of her stomach—and she can’t, or won’t, recognize what it is. She begins a search for the truth, desperately seeking a way to bring her best friend home. But when darker secrets come to light, Lizzie knows, deep down, that it’s the end of everything.
The End of Everything captures all of the confusion and distorted feelings of a thirteen-year-old girl who’s touched by a tragedy. As the plot weaves a spell of horror, it will leave that sick feeling in the bottom of your own stomach that tells you that something is dreadfully wrong. But, like passing a car wreck out on the highway, you won’t be able to look away, even though you know that you might see something that you’ll wish you never had. So you’ll keep reading.
Lizzie will break your heart as she grasps at whatever she can find to reach Evie—even if it’s a lie. Lizzie understands very little of what’s going on around her. All she knows is that her best friend is gone, and she has to save her. As a result, you’ll find yourself wanting to rescue Lizzie from what’s about to happen to her emotionally.
Some readers might not like the direction that The End of Everything takes, but it’s a very plausible scenario—a disquieting one that none of us wish to think about. This deep, disturbing novel will leave you with a hollow, empty ache in your heart, and it will haunt you for days to come after your finish the book.
I may not wish to read such a morbid novel on a regular basis, but I’ll be on the lookout for more by author Megan Abbott, for more of the intense and horrific drama that captured me—and held me prisoner—in The End of Everything.
