The Mystic and the Missing Girl

 

The Mystic and the Missing Girl is a cold-case light paranormal cozy mystery by Vikki VanSickle. Due out 8th Sept 2026 from Macmillan on their St. Martin's imprint, it's 336 pages and will be available in hardcover, audio, and ebook formats. It's worth noting that the ebook format has a handy interactive table of contents as well as interactive links and references throughout.

This is an engaging and well written cozy with a likeable female MC, a quirky band of secondary characters, a light paranormal element, and a cold case mystery. Drew has moved back to the small town where she grew up to take over her aunt's metaphysical goods shop after her aunt's death. Homecoming is not entirely drama free because of her aunt's prophetic involvement in a disappearance 20 years earlier. The character driven plot drags a bit in the first half, but finds its feet in the second. The ESP elements aren't too overdone and there's a nice classic mix of red herrings and investigation. There's a lot of foreshadowing for possible future books to come. 

The unabridged audiobook has a run time of 10 hours 25 minutes and is capably read by Veronica Hortiguela. She has a warm, well modulated alto voice and does a good job delineating the characters both male and female and range of ages. Sound and production quality are high throughout the read. 

The language is clean and there's no on-page graphic violence. 

Four stars. It would be a good choice for public or home library acquisition, or possibly a good buddy or book club read. 

Disclosure: I received an ARC at no cost from the author/publisher for review purposes.