Missing Since Monday by Ann M. Martin

From the Publisher

Maggie's taking care of her four-year-old sister for a week. On Monday morning, she puts Courtenay on the bus to school. That afternoon, Courtenay doesn't come home. She never made it to school that day. She's missing. The detectives looking for Courtenay have hardly any clues. Then Maggie starts getting threatening phone calls...and she thinks she's being followed. Whoever took Courtenay is after her, too. One thing's for sure: If the police don't find Courtenay soon, Maggie will be the next one missing.

Publishers Weekly

In With You and Without You, Martin wrote sensitively on the death of a parent, a plot different from the themes in her appealing Bummer Summer, Stage Fright, etc. This is the author's second novel that deals with real crises (and her first for older readers), as related by Maggie Ellis, 16. Maggie and her brother Mike care for their beloved stepsister, four-year-old Courtenay, during their parents' absence. One day, Courtenay fails to return on the school bus. The police believe the little girl is a kidnap victim, and their investigation uncovers shocking facts about the possible guilt of people in the Ellis's locale, and worse, the divorced mother of Maggie and Mike. The story is tense, gripping fare right up to the finale with this family, luckier than most who are never reunited with their missing children. Readers should memorize the author's intelligently presented guides to training little ones in safety: knowing their addresses, phone numbers, etc.; and avoiding all contact with would-be molesters. (10-up)

School Library Journal

Gr 6-9 Tenth-grade Maggie and her older brother Mike are in charge of their half-sister Courtenay while their dad and their stepmother take a long-postponed honeymoon. To their horror, four-year-old Courtenay fails to return home from preschool, and it doesn't take long for them to realize that she's the victim of kidnappingor worse. The book chronicles what happens, including the involvement of police, other agencies, and private individuals as they assemble around the grief-stricken family to help them deal with the situation and to put into effect the mechanisms to search for the missing child. There's a great deal of information concerning how a missing child search works; in fact, occasionally the weight of the information intrudes upon the novel. Despite that, however, the suspense builds steadily throughout, as readers try to determine not only what has happened to Courtenay and at whose hands, but also who is making harassing and suggestive phone calls to Maggie. One of the solutions is fairly predictable, but the other comes as a real surprise. Middle school readers, including reluctant ones, will really care what happens to Courtenay and her family. Susan F. Marcus, Pollard Middle School , Needham, Mass.

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