Desire Lines audiobook

This is the second of Christina Baker Kline's novels, published in the late 90's. She is my author of the year, so I have enjoyed reading her older works. The book about a young journalist coming home after ten years. She is haunted by the disappearance of her best friend on the night of her graduation, and this unsolved mystery had shaped her life. She comes home after a divorce, to face her ten year high school reunion. She needs to both solve the mystery and find herself. I thought it was well done, and I got quite wrapped up in it. I enjoyed it a lot. Christina Baker Kline is a talented nuanced author, who really understands character development and relational dynamics.

This was a slow burn of a story. A general inertia speaks to Kathryn’s emotional and physical lack of focus, as well as the questions about Jennifer in the days / weeks before her disappearance.As Kathryn avoids making decisions, CBK quietly discloses the details of the friends’ lives and leads us to the only conclusion possible.I think this was skillfully written. Thank you, CBK!

The novel is about a woman in search of finding herself but wrapped up in the plot of her best friend from high school that just went missing. It has an element of the chick-lit to it but also a touch of the mystery genre. An easy but engrossing read for me. This is the second book I have really enjoyed from this author.I enjoyed it so much that as I was nearing the end reading on the subway, the train actually made it all the way to my stop in mid-town Manhattan and then started leave to go back towards Queens and I did not even notice! I was practically back across the East River before I realized I needed to get off the train and head back into the city. I had a good laugh about that moment!

I really enjoyed this book. I'm always pleased when I enjoy multiple books from the same author (Orphan Train was my first of hers) and I'll definitely check out the rest!

I love Christina Baker Kline's books. I believe with reading this one, I have read all her fiction to date! Fabulous story teller. Lovely prose!

Contrary to what the title suggests, this book is not about desire as it relates to human wants. Rather, the title comes from the activity called orienteering, where participants use a map and a compass to navigate from one point to another in unfamiliar territory. According to one of the characters in the book who heads a local chapter of people who engage in orienteering, if one becomes lost in the woods, they can find their way out by following "desire lines," which are faint paths through the woods made by others apart from any established trails. Closely following a desire line should bring you eventually to a safe place.The premise for the story is that Jennifer vanishes on the night of her high school graduation, just hours after the big event. The last people to see her alive are 5 of her high school classmates. No one knows what happened to Jennifer that night. Now, 10 years later, there is to be a class reunion. Jennifer's best friend, Kathryn, comes back to town, not for the reunion, but to escape her failed marriage and to spend some time with her mother. Since she has some writing experience and talent, while in town, she is asked by the editor of a local paper to investigate Jennifer's disappearance, to interview her teachers and family and friends and see if she can shed any light on what happened to Jennifer that night.The story isn't so much about what happened to Jennifer (although that issue is resolved by the end of the book), as it is about Kathryn's journey to find out about herself. She has spent the last 10 years basically just treading water in her life, not really knowing where she was headed or what she really wanted. Her failed marriage served as the impetus to take her back to her home town, where she was forced to confront her past (as it pertained to Jennifer's disappearance) and come to terms with what happened. It's more a story of self-discovery than anything else.But, the story is well-written, the story line is an interesting one, and I learned some things about orienteering, which I never really knew anything about until I read this book.

I have been obsessed with this author ever since I discovered her several months back. Every single novel of hers is utterly absorbing, intelligent, and compassionate. And in all them, the central female character is incredibly well drawn--complex and human. So glad I stumbled across her at my local library!

Missed opportunitiesMissed opportunities to pay attention to your friends. What they're about, what they're going through, what they're afraid of, who they really are. To me, that's what this book was all about. I found it interesting and thought provoking.

The book moves rather slowly. Does not really pick up until about 1/2-way through. In essence, it picks up speed at that point, and becomes quite gripping! Orphan Train was outstanding, and while I enjoyed her other novels, I wish I had read them first.

I love this writer. I think I've read almost all of her fiction now. This books is suspenseful and just an intriguing story. I love a good storyteller and she is definitely one of them.

Loved it. I fail to understand the abundance of negative reviews.

DESIRE LINES, by Christina Baker Kline, is a suspenseful, fresh, and emotionally complex novel by the creator of such masterpieces as "Orphan Train" and "A Piece of the World". On the night of her high school graduation in 1986, Kathryn Campbell is sitting around a bonfire with her four closest friends. The night ends when the beautiful but erratic Jennifer walks away from the dying embers of the bonfire and walks towards the dark w. By the next day, Jennifer vanishes without a trace. Ten years have passed, but Kathryn still feels an empty void in her life, as well as a nagging, guilty feeling that she has failed Jennifer. When Kathryn gets divorced, it sends her reeling back to the town in Maine where she grew up. It is there that Kathryn, a young journalist, finds herself face-to-face with her past. She is twenty-eight years old and has been living on memories and questions for far too long. She knows she needs to take a hard look at her own life, while she's also trying to solve the mystery of what happened to Jennifer. As Kathryn examines the seemingly random events that led up to Jennifer's disappearance, she notices a pattern slowly beginning to develop. All the pieces of the puzzle are there; it's just a matter of whether Kathryn can put them together in a sensible way. As Kathryn confronts her own fear and grief, she finally comes to terms with the way the loss of her friend has shaped her life and the lives of those who knew Jennifer. Meanwhile, Kathryn realizes that if she is going to understand the circumstances of Jennifer's disappearance, she is going to have to expose herself to the same risks and dangers that Jennifer did. In the end, Kathryn's search to find the truth becomes a quest to save her own life as she races against time to avoid the same fate that Jennifer had. We would recommend this remarkable novel of friendship, memory, loss, and resurrection, to those who are fans of the author's other works and to those who like stories about old friendships, as well as those who like unsolved mysteries.

Because I enjoyed Kline's Orphan Train and A Piece of the World so much, I've decided to read everything else she was published. If I had not read these two, I would most likely have rated Desire Lines a "5" but compared to them, Desire Lines is a "4" - and it's still a brilliant book and a good read.Six friends went through high school together, a close group of three boys and three girls. On their graduation night they had a party on the banks of the Kenduskeag Stream near Bangor. One of the girls decided to leave, refusing offers of others to accompany her home - and that was the last time anyone saw Jennifer alive.Desire Lines is set in the summer as the class is about to celebrate their tenth anniversary. Jennifer's disappearance is still an open case but nothing new has been discovered in the intervening years. Kathryn, who had been Jennifer's best friend in high school, is asked to write an article about her for the Bangor paper. And in the novel Kathryn discovers how little she knew her friend - and how little she knew herself. This book might be of interest to anyone who went to high school! /some of us might recognize our own high school selves in the pages of Desire Lines - and some of us might question how our own experiences differ from this fictitious story - or not.

I remember my high school group of friends... each of us had our own aspiration and dreams and swore we never would lose touch. This book albeit a mystery took me back to high school. Yes dear readers I loved high school! I had read Kline's Orphan Train and a lot of Goodreads Readers prefer that one but I am the lone minority that prefers Desire Lines. It is different from the other books I have read by Kline. Setting 1986 a group of friends Jennifer, Kathryn (Jennifer's best friend) Jennifer's twin brother Will, Brian, Rachel and Jack are partying at graduation. Jennifer says she wants to be alone and walks home. She disappears and is never heard from again. 1996: Kathryn is divorced and drifting aimlessly. She comes home temporarily to live with her mother. She is given an assignment to write on Jennifer's disappearance ten years later. Sudden;y she finds herself in danger. What could have been a cliched story is saved by wonderful writing of the poignant yet brutal past and suspense on every page!

This is a book by Christina Baker Kline and in the same way Orphan Train inspired so does this book. It takes place in Maine on the night of graduation, when a classmate leaves the beach party and disappears seemingly into thin air. Ten years later Kathryn returns to her home after a failed marriage ; just as the class plans their reunion. She takes a job with a former classmate who runs the local newspaper, to try to find out what could have happened to their classmate Jennifer. The story weaves its' way around the members of the class, former teachers, the parents and siblings of the girl who disappeared. It is a tale that captures your attention and deals with human feelings, change and ultimately the truth of the matter is discovered. Great book with a lot of interpersonal interaction and feeling.

Unsolved mysteryI love Christina Baker Kline’s books. She has such talent in weaving a story and making it so readable. This book was no exception. This is a story about a woman, recently divorced, who returns to her small hometown in Maine. At the end of her senior year in high school, her best friend goes missing. Now, ten years later, she is still haunted by this unsolved case. She is a journalist, and the local newspaper assigns her the job of writing an article about the case. Her article touches a nerve and puts her in danger and makes her question how well any of us really know another person. This was a captivating story with strong characters. It kept me interested. I didn’t give it 5 stars because I did feel that there were some unrealistic actions and the resolution was not totally complete. But it was still a really good book!

I was duped by the title - thank goodness! Imagining some sort of racy romance novel (not that there's anything wrong with that type of book but just not something I usually read), I read the blurb on the back cover, which led me to believe it was some sort of mystery/thriller - yay! Okay then.This was well written and I didn't get bored (some might find it a bit wordy and want to writer to get on with it) - I felt what was written was necessary to the plot and nothing could be left out. Its mainly about the main character, Kathryn, and how she has dealt with the mysterious disappearance of her best friend ten years ago. I found her to be relatable and believable. Yep, the mystery does get solved at the end. It only took me a few days to finish, so it's a quick read.