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The Stone Forest
Determined to remember the tragic night long ago that led to her sister's disappearance and her mother's appointment as the first female governor of Indiana, Jenna Kirk returns to her childhood home and is soon plunged into a world of terror where someone close to her will stop at nothing to keep the truth buried forever. Original.
400 pages, MIRA
First published January 1, 2002
12 people are currently reading
360 people want to read
About the author
Karen Harper
105 books1,500 followersA New York Times and USA Today bestselling author, Karen Harper is a former college English instructor (The Ohio State University) and high school literature and writing teacher. A lifelong Ohioan, Karen and her husband Don divide their time between the midwest and the southeast, both locations she has used in her books. Besides her American settings, Karen loves the British Isles, where her Scottish and English roots run deep, and where she has set many of her historical Tudor-era mysteries and her historical novels about real and dynamic British women. Karen's books have been published in many foreign languages and she won the Mary Higgins Clark Award for 2005. Karen has given numerous talks to readers and writers across the county. Her most recent books include THE SOUTH SHORES TRILOGY (CHASING SHADOWS, DROWNING TIDES and FALLING DARKNESS.) Her latest historical is THE ROYAL NANNY. Please visit her website at www.KarenHarperAuthor and her fb page at www.facebook.com/KarenHarperAuthor
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 38 reviews
March 17, 2020
2.5 stars. This romantic suspense was published in 2002. Fifteen years ago, sisters Jenna, 16, and Mandi, 18, were kidnapped. A ransom demand was made but only Jenna was returned. Jenna remembers being drugged, tied up, and kept in a cave. To this day, she is claustrophobic. At 30 years old, Jenna is living in the house her grandmother left for her. She designs and builds luxury tree houses. Now, that's different.
Jenna's best friend Cassie and Mandi's old boyfriend Mace come back to town. All the major players are back together and Cassie and Jenna are determined to find out what happened. But someone is trying to frighten Jenna. She spots footprints outside her window and someone seems to have been in her house.
Readers learn a lot about caving in this story. I didn't know who the kidnappers were until the end. I suspected someone I shouldn't have because of one item mentioned several times. You'll probably spot it too.
A few threads were not totally explained. A couple of the characters dropped from the storyline abruptly.
Jenna's best friend Cassie and Mandi's old boyfriend Mace come back to town. All the major players are back together and Cassie and Jenna are determined to find out what happened. But someone is trying to frighten Jenna. She spots footprints outside her window and someone seems to have been in her house.
Readers learn a lot about caving in this story. I didn't know who the kidnappers were until the end. I suspected someone I shouldn't have because of one item mentioned several times. You'll probably spot it too.
A few threads were not totally explained. A couple of the characters dropped from the storyline abruptly.
May 21, 2025
Dragged the whole time but I was surprised who did it
February 1, 2025
Good for a beach read
April 30, 2024
This book was given to me by a friend because she and her husband really liked it. It was suspenseful but I was not impressed. The characters were not compelling. The ending was somewhat a surprise but that did not make it worth reading just to find out the ending.
May 11, 2019
Easy read mystery with a slightly usual "who-done-it" ending. I would read other books by this author.
June 18, 2019
Awesome! Really enjoyed.
August 26, 2020
Valendo como 3.5.
A construção do suspense é ótima, mas falta impacto na revelação final, e alguns detalhes ficaram sem explicação.
A construção do suspense é ótima, mas falta impacto na revelação final, e alguns detalhes ficaram sem explicação.
May 3, 2021
A very good mix of suspense and romance.
February 24, 2022
A good read, if you can handle how slowly the story progresses.
September 18, 2022
A little slow at first , but seemed to keep getting better with each chapter. I thought the ending was real good.
April 20, 2024
Fantastic book !!!! Lots of surprises and twists and turns!!
April 13, 2025
Interestingly enough, the book is poorly written but the storyline is decent. Very easy to skim.
August 16, 2025
It was an OK book. Dragged on a bit
March 24, 2008
Three words - Uninspiring, slow, and unromantic. This book was nowhere near as interesting as I'd thought it would be. I picked this one up at a Thrift store, and when I read the blurb on the back, I thought it looked fascinating, but it ended up being pretty damn boring.
The story at it's core was interesting enough, but while reading it, it just seems to drag on and on. The plot is low-intensity, slow-moving, and just generally lackluster. There was a ton of potential for the plot, but it never materialized. I just kept thinking: come on! something exciting needs to happen! For a book that in the end was mostly suspense versus a romance, the plot needed to grab the reader's attention better. The whole thing just seemed like a series of little, half interesting events.
The romance...what romance? The love story in this Romantic Suspense was only a small step above the romance in the one and only unromantic Lisa Jackson book I read. The whole romance is based on Jenna, and the fact that she's been in love with Mace since she was a kid, but Mace had been her sister's boyfriend. When she goes back home, he returns not long after because his father has been diagnosed with a terminal illness. There's no development to this pairing. For Jenna, she just loves him, period. That's all the readers get from her. For Mace, he comes back and he suddenly wants Jenna and a future with her. There's this line near the beginning where he thinks about how during the years he was away, his sister (Jenna's best friend) told him once that Jenna had a huge crush on him and he thinks to himself that the more he thought about that fact, the more intrigued he was by it. That's it. The so-called love between them is built with little contact or anything. They just seem to be in love. During the book, they hardly spend any time together. They kiss a few times, and spontaneously tell each other they love each other. It was boring as hell. I didn't believe for a second in their "love" and wasn't inspired by their store at all. It was stupid. It just very barely qualifies as a romantic suspense.
So all in all, there wasn't anything I found particularly interesting about this book. I couldn't wait to finish it. For something with such a good blurb on the back, the end product was a total let-down.
The story at it's core was interesting enough, but while reading it, it just seems to drag on and on. The plot is low-intensity, slow-moving, and just generally lackluster. There was a ton of potential for the plot, but it never materialized. I just kept thinking: come on! something exciting needs to happen! For a book that in the end was mostly suspense versus a romance, the plot needed to grab the reader's attention better. The whole thing just seemed like a series of little, half interesting events.
The romance...what romance? The love story in this Romantic Suspense was only a small step above the romance in the one and only unromantic Lisa Jackson book I read. The whole romance is based on Jenna, and the fact that she's been in love with Mace since she was a kid, but Mace had been her sister's boyfriend. When she goes back home, he returns not long after because his father has been diagnosed with a terminal illness. There's no development to this pairing. For Jenna, she just loves him, period. That's all the readers get from her. For Mace, he comes back and he suddenly wants Jenna and a future with her. There's this line near the beginning where he thinks about how during the years he was away, his sister (Jenna's best friend) told him once that Jenna had a huge crush on him and he thinks to himself that the more he thought about that fact, the more intrigued he was by it. That's it. The so-called love between them is built with little contact or anything. They just seem to be in love. During the book, they hardly spend any time together. They kiss a few times, and spontaneously tell each other they love each other. It was boring as hell. I didn't believe for a second in their "love" and wasn't inspired by their store at all. It was stupid. It just very barely qualifies as a romantic suspense.
So all in all, there wasn't anything I found particularly interesting about this book. I couldn't wait to finish it. For something with such a good blurb on the back, the end product was a total let-down.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
April 24, 2010
I have read Harper before in the HF genre. This is my first mystery by her. Although marketed as romantic suspense there's not much romance in it and to tell the truth not that much suspense either.
Jenna is a young woman haunted by the disappearance of her big sister a few years back. They were both kidnapped, a ransom was asked for but never paid and Jenna was the only one returned. She has no memory of the events as her doctor keeps telling her to forget and move on but she continues to live in the same place where the events happened. Her mother declared her sister dead and moved on to become a successful politician and she keeps insisting that Jenna moves out of the place where she lives so she can move on too. She resists moving but then she starts getting weird packages in the mail and phone calls with her sister's voice which seems to suggest that Mandi is not dead or someone wants to scare Jenna. At the same time Mace, Mandi's boyfriend at the time of the kidnapping for whom Jenna had a big crush, returns and his sister, Jenna’s best friend, starts investigating her mother's life to write a biography.
I thought this story had interesting potential but the truth is that it fell short from fulfilling my expectations. First of all I couldn't see how Jenna was still in love with Mace after so much time and why he suddenly decided he was in love with her too. Then I had an idea early on about who the kidnapper could be and it turns out that I was right even if in the middle I was second guessing my hunch. The death of Mace's mother and Jenna's father seemed at first to have some meaning but then it's never developed and the fact is that there wasn't much going on. There wasn't much suspense and the motive for the kidnapping didn't seem very solid. After reading a few fast paced page turners in this genre earlier this week this was a total let down for me in terms of suspense and a solid plot.
Grade 2/5
Jenna is a young woman haunted by the disappearance of her big sister a few years back. They were both kidnapped, a ransom was asked for but never paid and Jenna was the only one returned. She has no memory of the events as her doctor keeps telling her to forget and move on but she continues to live in the same place where the events happened. Her mother declared her sister dead and moved on to become a successful politician and she keeps insisting that Jenna moves out of the place where she lives so she can move on too. She resists moving but then she starts getting weird packages in the mail and phone calls with her sister's voice which seems to suggest that Mandi is not dead or someone wants to scare Jenna. At the same time Mace, Mandi's boyfriend at the time of the kidnapping for whom Jenna had a big crush, returns and his sister, Jenna’s best friend, starts investigating her mother's life to write a biography.
I thought this story had interesting potential but the truth is that it fell short from fulfilling my expectations. First of all I couldn't see how Jenna was still in love with Mace after so much time and why he suddenly decided he was in love with her too. Then I had an idea early on about who the kidnapper could be and it turns out that I was right even if in the middle I was second guessing my hunch. The death of Mace's mother and Jenna's father seemed at first to have some meaning but then it's never developed and the fact is that there wasn't much going on. There wasn't much suspense and the motive for the kidnapping didn't seem very solid. After reading a few fast paced page turners in this genre earlier this week this was a total let down for me in terms of suspense and a solid plot.
Grade 2/5
November 7, 2013
Fifteen years ago Jenna and Amanda Kirk (sisters) were kidnapped and held for ransom in a cave. Days later, Jenna was found wandering the Stone Forest (situated on her grandparent's property)with no memory of what happened. Amanda (Mandi) was never found. The Stone Forest contains limestone statues that her grandfather carved.
Jenna has inherited her grandparent's home and now lives there. She started her own business "Out on a Limb" and builds custom tree houses for families.
Someone doesn't want Leah back home. She receives mysterious gifts and letters. The threats turn murderous when someone tampers with the ropes she uses to hang from the trees while she builds the tree houses.
She teams up with her childhood friend, Cassie, and Cassie's brother, Mace, to find out what happened to her sister 15 years ago and also try to find out who is terrorizing her.
Her mother, Cynthia, is a politician and is considering running for Vice President. Her father died in a rock slide accident, along with Cassie's and Mace's mother 20 years ago.
Mace was a suspect in their disappearance as he and Mandi were a couple when she disappeared (although not exclusive on her part). He was cleared and immediately moved out of the area.
Jenna and Mace fall in love, but feel they have to solve Mandi's disappearance before they can move on with their relationship.
Jenna has inherited her grandparent's home and now lives there. She started her own business "Out on a Limb" and builds custom tree houses for families.
Someone doesn't want Leah back home. She receives mysterious gifts and letters. The threats turn murderous when someone tampers with the ropes she uses to hang from the trees while she builds the tree houses.
She teams up with her childhood friend, Cassie, and Cassie's brother, Mace, to find out what happened to her sister 15 years ago and also try to find out who is terrorizing her.
Her mother, Cynthia, is a politician and is considering running for Vice President. Her father died in a rock slide accident, along with Cassie's and Mace's mother 20 years ago.
Mace was a suspect in their disappearance as he and Mandi were a couple when she disappeared (although not exclusive on her part). He was cleared and immediately moved out of the area.
Jenna and Mace fall in love, but feel they have to solve Mandi's disappearance before they can move on with their relationship.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
May 28, 2013
A young woman returns to her home town in order to end some of her personal demons. She and her sister had been kidnapped while in high school, and her sister was never found. Jenna was released, Mandy was not.She wants to reclaim her life and thinks that she can do that by returning. While there, she discovers the truth and it does not set her free. Vivid, imaginative, this book really enthralls the reader. The details of the limestone trade were an added bonus. I had not anticipated that those details would be of such interest.
September 17, 2012
Two sisters, Amanda and Jenna, disappear, Jenna was found wandering and Amanda was found.
16 years later Cynthia Kirk, the mother of the two girls is now the governor of her home state of Indiana. Jenna is 30 years old, and still has no memory of the time when she and Amanda went missiing. But someone is trying to frighten her away from her home.
Yadda, yadda, yadda. Don't know why I am so impatient with these romance-suspense novels that I used to consume like candy.
16 years later Cynthia Kirk, the mother of the two girls is now the governor of her home state of Indiana. Jenna is 30 years old, and still has no memory of the time when she and Amanda went missiing. But someone is trying to frighten her away from her home.
Yadda, yadda, yadda. Don't know why I am so impatient with these romance-suspense novels that I used to consume like candy.
August 24, 2008
THis is a good book so far,I myself love to read books like this,and everything is staying interesting.It's about Two teenage girls dissapearing one night and only one was let go and found wondering in the woods with no memory what's so ever of what happend. So 16 years later she starts feeling gilt and hurt that someone is trying to cover her for her sisters death.
August 15, 2009
this book had a lot of variety going for it--the mystery of what happened to a sister, tree houses, a little politics, tragedy, stone cutting and cave exploring. there were twists and turns, accidents and death as several people sought to find out what had actually happened to Mandi. Mandi, was she a sweet older sister? read the book and find out.
March 26, 2013
Really enjoy Karen Harper's style - what with all the plot twist and turns - it keeps me interested till the very end and the conclusions are always surprising yet just right.
Another book of hers I have read are: The Falls another cliff hanger.
She is quickly becoming another of my must read authors
Another book of hers I have read are: The Falls another cliff hanger.
She is quickly becoming another of my must read authors
January 9, 2008
If you like a good mystery that isnt obvious I would recommend this book. It is about 2 young girls that are kidnapped but only one returns. Years later she is haunted by her sister who never dies...or is it her sisters killers haunting her.
August 20, 2014
This was not the best written book, but I only guessed one of the guilty parties. I found it totally unbelievable that a gal with claustrophobia so severe that she couldn't walk into a walk-in closet voluntarily went deep underground and into a cave for 10+ hours.
December 14, 2007
This book was beyond dreadful. It is possible her historicals and mysteries are better than her contemporaries but I decided my life was too short to spend any time investigating.
July 14, 2009
Very interesting so far.
July 12, 2008
I loved this book! it was creepy!
July 28, 2008
I read this book awhile ago and I still remember the story and being gripped by it. I decided to add it to good reads so that you guys could read it if you are interested in a nice quick good book.
September 17, 2008
A good suspense/romance with some great twists. I think the author went a little overboard with cultural references to the 80's and 90's, but overall a very good read!
December 3, 2008
I really enjoyed this mystery novel. A very nice rainy day, beach-going type of book.
January 30, 2009
Wow, this author is overrated. Boring, no suspense after first chapter.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 38 reviews