Hide and Seek by Jane Casey

Hide and Seek (Jess Tennant #3)

by Jane Casey 

Jess Tennant's classmate is kidnapped right before the Christmas holiday in this third novel in Jane Casey's brilliant young adult mystery series.

It's Christmas in Port Sentinel, the tiny English town where Jess Tennant has been living for more than a year now. She wasn't sure how she felt about moving away from London when her mom dragged her to Port Sentinel right before 

Hardcover, 288 pages

Published August 25th 2015 by St. Martin's Griffin (first published July 30th 2015)   Review copy received from readingteen.net

It's the Christmas season and Jess is trying to find out what happened to Gilly, right when family and boyfriend problems also occur. Jess Tennant is one of those unforgettable characters, and very consistent. You never doubt that when she is "advised" to not do something, she is the first one in line. When her project partner goes missing on the night they are scheduled to meet. Jess goes to her home to see if everything is ok. Turns out that Gilly is gone. Jess begins to investigate if Gilly could be a runaway or worse, dead. Giving the reader several different directions the story can go, Jess then begins to break down all the clues and questioning those in Gilly's life.

As the series has progressed Jess is opening up to working directly with the police. And by that I mean give them the information she feels in necessary to act on things she can't. Gilly has lived with her abusive mother for years and is dying for some attention and affection in her life. Jess finds her journal early on in the story but it's cryptic.

She spends the rest of the novel trying to decipher what the diary entries mean. By pinpointing who she was with on certain days and what her relationship was with them.

Jess tends to fixate on things that tend to bother her. She doesn't give up and even puts her own life in danger to help others and find answers.