Stolen

by Colleen Bergquist

A hidden newspaper article. A teen girl who has an eerie resemblance to a toddler whose kidnapping remains unsolved.

As the only child of a single mother, thirteen-year-old Emma McKay has never attended school, had friends, or been allowed to visit public places. She has moved more times than she can remember, and has no pictures of herself as a child. But it isn’t until she discovers a newspaper article tucked away in a file marked personal that she begins to question who she is and begins to wonder Is she living a secret life?

How far will she go to discover the truth?

With lots of questions and no one she can ask, she decides she must take matters into her own hands and runs away to try to find out the truth.

Alone in a strange city, she finds herself unprepared for the challenges and setbacks she will face as she tries to keep anyone from finding her and seeks help from the police who refuse to believe her.

The choices she makes could alter people’s lives forever

An unexpected ally will step in to help Emma, but will it be in time, or will she be forced to return to the only life she has known with a woman who might not be her mother without getting the answers she needs?

This gripping young adult suspense book can be read by upper elementary-aged children through adults. It is the first book in a trilogy about a girl’s search for her true identity.

222 pages, Kindle Edition

Published September 16, 2024

Reviews

[Lori Miller · Rating 4 out of 5]

In this debut novel by Colleen Bergquist, young teenager Emma finds herself questioning her whole life up until the present. Who is she, really? Why is her mother so protective? Is her mother even the person Emma thinks she is? Emma relies on friendship, research and her own courage and determination to get to the bottom of her nagging doubts and questions. As a character, one of Emma’s greatest strengths is her ability to know when and how to ask for help. Unlike protagonists in many lesser novels in this category, Emma behaves like an actual young teen. While she is quite intelligent and resourceful, she does not have unexplained, convenient “superpowers” that allow her to be more clever and wise than all the adults around her. She doubts herself and her choices, and we see her be at times impulsive, and at other times cautious and hesitant. It’s refreshing to see that dynamic in a fictional teen. I believe people of any age can relate to the shifting moods and character growth we see in Emma. This is a wholesome, yet suspenseful journey. I will admit I was up until 2am needing to know how it ended...and am looking forward to the next two books, because even though this part of the story has a satisfying resolution, there are just enough lingering questions to fill out a trilogy!

[Jessica Kenyon · Rating 3 out of 5]

Let me first say that I didn’t know this was a YA book, as I picked it up at a boozy book fair and the back details were intriguing. While I enjoyed the overall story, there was so much going on with this book. There were so many grammatical errors. Normally this doesn’t bother me, but I often found that I would get lost because dialogue would start/end in the middle of a paragraph with no quotation marks or any indication that the speaker had switched. Couple this with a lot of run on sentences that repeated the same thing in three different ways. I was getting confused as an adult, so I can’t imagine reading this as a teenager. This was also extremely repetitive. There was a common theme that 3 chapters in a row would be about the exact same thing. It felt like I was reading a piece of work that was trying to hit a page/word count. Throughout the story, there were details that didn’t add up. It said multiple times that the train would arrive around 4pm, and the main character had 3 different bags. But then all of a sudden her train arrived at 10am and she only had a backpack? Admittedly I am not the target audience, which I own as I didn’t look into this very thoroughly. With that said, I think the tiny details are important.

[Samantha Magee · Rating 2 out of 5]

The story was interesting, but everything else about it was honestly pretty awful. The characters would repeat the same things over and over and *over* again. The reactions of the supporting characters were totally unrealistic. And the dialogue was so unbelievable. I know I’m not a teenager, but I also know teenagers don’t talk to each other the way they did in this book. Reading it was painful, and I only finished it because I was at least mildly interested in how things would turn out.

[k mandra · Rating 3 out of 5]

This a YA novel. I like that the main character (a sheltered, highly protected girl) works through a problem she has and the questions it leaves her with. She demonstrates some flawed thinking that would be typical of a young girl. Characters were developed well and were believable--both juvenile and adult. After about the mid-point the plot was a lot of tell with limited show and, additionally it seemed to follow a rinse and repeat format. This is part of a trilogy so I don't know if the situation will be addressed in book 2 but the reader was left not knowing what the back story really was.
This was an ARC and I know that they haven't gone through complete proofreading/editing but this one was so full of grammar and punctuation errors that it was occasionally difficult to read. Often quotation marks were missing and/or dialog for two different people was blended with incomplete punctation within the same paragraph. I wish it had received a bit more attention before being shared as an ARC.

[Michelle Werre · Rating 5 out of 5]

A fantastic, suspenseful read! The character development was great and really made me care about the main character, Emma. I wanted to keep turning the pages to find out what happens as the story of her life unfolds. I cannot wait until the next book is released to find out how her life changes after the plot of this one has been resolved!

[Victoria Hamel · Rating 4 out of 5]

Emma’s Journey to Find The Truth

Her life changes in a flash, and she learns about identity and perseverance. Emma and Megan are well formed characters!