Chasing Amanda is a gripping family drama driven by suspense and emotionally compelling characters. It explores themes of parenting, a mother's love, and the challenge of trusting one's faith. The story comes at you with breakneck speed and just a touch of the paranormal.

Nine years ago, Molly Tanner witnessed a young girl's abduction in the bustling city of Philadelphia, which shifted her occasional clairvoyance into overdrive. Two days later, the girl's body was found, and Molly's life fell apart. Consumed by guilt for not acting upon her visions and on the brink of losing her family, Molly fled the torturous reminders in the city, seeking refuge in the close-knit rural community of Boyds, Maryland.

Molly's life finds a semblance of normalcy as her son begins college, and she and her husband rekindle their relationship. However, their fresh start is shattered when a seven-year-old girl disappears from a local park near Molly's home. Unable to turn her back on another child and haunted by memories of the past, Molly embarks on a quest to find the missing girl, jeopardizing the marriage she fought so hard to preserve.

As Molly unearths clues and struggles to decipher her visions, she discovers a hidden side of Boyds, where the residents—and the land itself—harbor potentially lethal secrets. She also uncovers another side of her husband, one that threatens to tear them apart.

Philip Pullman is fast becoming a modern-day Dickens for young adults. The setting is the same, the strong eye for characters is there, as are the brooding atmosphere, the social conscience, and the ability to spin plot within plot.

Sally Lockhart is now a young woman, left alone with a toddler. Nothing prepares her for the shock of receiving a summons from a man she has never even heard of, suing for divorce and the custody of her beloved Harriet. Sally struggles against the net closing around her, seeking to find out who is persecuting her and why.

The writing style is lively and direct, and there's lots of action.
This is a suspense novel with a conscience, and a most enjoyable one.