From the Publisher
"Medema delivers on the heartbreaking premise of Message Not Found, offering a beautiful tapestry of grief and friendship, with the hint of a mystery woven seamlessly throughout. Bailey’s loss is as compelling as her search for answers, and readers will cling to the unraveling secrets along with her." — Kyrie McCauley, Morris Award-winning author of If These Wings Could Fly
"A beautifully written, compulsively readable tale of friendship and grief in its many forms, Message Not Found is a timely stunner. Medema is skilled at seeing into the heart of hard subjects, and tackling them with grace. A must-read." — Liz Lawson, author of The Lucky Ones and The Agathas
"Message Not Found is a compelling mystery; immensely readable. Bailey’s search for the truth drives the reader to turn page after page." — Mikki Daughtry, co-author of New York Times bestsellers Five Feet Apart and All This Time
"Message Not Found is a compelling look at the complexity of relationships, secrets, grief, and growing up. The characters and friendships walk straight off the page, while the mystery drives you forward. Prepare to exert extreme self-control in order to not race to the end!" — Jenna Evans Welch, New York Times bestselling author of Love & Gelato
"Intricately plotted and emotionally impactful, this story suspensefully and viscerally peels back the layers of friendship. [A] skillfully crafted tale." — Kirkus Reviews
"For readers who loved Nina LaCour’s We Are Okay and E. Lockhart’s We Were Liars, this book brings to light the heartache, pain, and emptiness felt when grieving from a loss." — School Library Journal
"Medema captures perfectly the crushing grief of losing a friend and the mess of emotions it involves." — Booklist
Mikki Daughtry
"Message Not Found is a compelling mystery; immensely readable. Bailey’s search for the truth drives the reader to turn page after page."
Kyrie McCauley
"Medema delivers on the heartbreaking premise of Message Not Found, offering a beautiful tapestry of grief and friendship, with the hint of a mystery woven seamlessly throughout. Bailey’s loss is as compelling as her search for answers, and readers will cling to the unraveling secrets along with her."
Jenna Evans Welch
"Message Not Found is a compelling look at the complexity of relationships, secrets, grief, and growing up. The characters and friendships walk straight off the page, while the mystery drives you forward. Prepare to exert extreme self-control in order to not race to the end!"
Booklist
"Medema captures perfectly the crushing grief of losing a friend and the mess of emotions it involves."
Liz Lawson
"A beautifully written, compulsively readable tale of friendship and grief in its many forms, Message Not Found is a timely stunner. Medema is skilled at seeing into the heart of hard subjects, and tackling them with grace. A must-read."
Booklist
"Medema captures perfectly the crushing grief of losing a friend and the mess of emotions it involves."
School Library Journal
02/01/2022
Gr 9 Up—This book brings to light the heartache, pain, and emptiness felt when grieving from a loss. Anchorage, AK, teen Bailey (short brown bob) and her best friend Vanessa (long red hair) are the definition of best friends. But when Vanessa dies in a car accident in a part of town far from her house, Bailey is left with many unanswered questions about where her friend was going that night. Bailey misses Vanessa so much that she creates a chat bot using Vanessa's old texts and emails they shared together. Bailey, hoping this bot will bring her closure, bites off more than she can chew when she learns through AI-Vanessa that Vanessa was hiding a secret that would have torn them apart. Medema's story focuses mostly on Bailey's grief, which is heightened by her relationships with her ex-boyfriend Cade, who seemingly wants to be with her again, and Vanessa's boyfriend Mason, who relies heavily on Bailey for companionship. The way Bailey deals with grief feels completely natural and realistic; she is an emotional and introspective character. Readers will sympathize with her, but may also ponder how far is too far when it comes to receiving closure. In the end, Bailey learns an important lesson about what true friendship feels like, and that forgiveness may be the key to dealing with grief. Most characters appear white. VERDICT For readers who loved Nina LaCour's We Are Okay and E. Lockhart's We Were Liars.—Kharissa Kenner
Kirkus Reviews
2021-12-24
Heartbreak is best remedied with Pop Rocks, ice cream, and illicit champagne. If only all wounds were so easily mended.
On a snowy January night, Tundra Cove High School senior Bailey Pierce is drowning her sorrows over ex-boyfriend Cade with her best friend, Vanessa Carson, when Vanessa receives a text that causes her to flee their cozy sleepover and head out into the treacherous Alaskan night. She never makes it home. Her car is found beneath the cliff below an icy mountain road—a road she shouldn’t have been on if she were heading home to meet her boyfriend, Mason, as she claimed. Grief-stricken and unsatisfied with the explanation of the accident, Bailey, who has been coding since she was 4, creates a virtual Vanessa from an old AI program created by one of her moms. V, as she nicknames the chatbot, effectively simulates Vanessa, a former Junior Olympics–bound cross-country skier and keen book blogger, but the V that emerges is not the friend Bailey thought she knew. Intricately plotted and emotionally impactful, this story suspensefully and viscerally peels back the layers of the girls’ friendship. Short chapters, Google search histories, and strings of text messages heighten the emotional punch, while the ethical implications of Bailey’s creation are thought-provoking. Main characters read as White; Esther, Bailey’s newfound friend, is cued as Indigenous.
Emotions run high in this skillfully crafted tale. (Fiction. 14-18)
