Return to Sender by Lauren Draper

Title: Return to Sender

Author: Lauren Draper

Genre: Mystery

Publisher: Pan Macmillan

Published: 25^th Jube 2024

Format: Paperback

Pages: 384

Price: $26.99

Synopsis: SHORTLISTED FOR THE QLD LITERARY AWARDS YOUNG ADULT BOOK AWARD 2025
SHORTLISTED FOR THE AUSTRALIAN BOOK DESIGN AWARDS 2025 BEST DESIGNED YOUNG ADULT COVER
After three years away, seventeen-year-old Brodie McKellon has returned to live with her eccentric grandmother above the last remaining Dead Letter Office – the place letters go when no one is left to claim them.
Soon, Brodie is consumed by an unsolved mystery – the unclaimed letters of a group of teens who seemed to vanish many years ago – while also attempting to reconcile with her former best friends, Elliot and Levi.
As the trio is drawn into the riddle of the dead letter writers, they discover that the past is never truly past, and that it’s never too late for old wrongs to be put right . . .
LONGLISTED FOR THE INDIE BOOK AWARDS FOR YOUNG ADULTS 2025
CBCA BOOK OF THE YEAR NOTABLE 2025 BOOK OF THE YEAR: OLDER READERS

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Brodie McKellon has been away at boarding school for three years, but now, after certain events forced her to leave, she’s back home. Home with her eccentric grandmother who lives above the Dead Letter Office. This is the place where unclaimed letters go, because there is nobody around to claim them. Her return to the small town triggers her discovery of letters between three friends back in the 1990s. June, Winnie and August, whose friendship seemed to splinter at some stage.

Brodie is alone – her dad is a roadie, her mum is dead, and she only has two friends, Levi and Elliot who are helping her unravel the mystery of the three friends and who they were.

But digging into the past reveals more than what the three friends thought they would find. It’s a mystery about what drove the three friends in the past apart, how they were affected and where they all ended up. There is a sense of connection to everything throughout the novel, something feels like the characters are connected in more ways than we initially thought. What happened to August, and what was the Adder Stone?  Everything about the past is used well, to show what happened three years ago, and Brodie’s desire to prove that certain things that people are saying and have said about her are wrong. It’s character as well as plot that drives the novel.

This book had several plots and subplots to follow, some that were made up mythology of the world, but these aspects of a story are always fun and interesting. They often add a layer to the story that gives it something more and that shapes the plot and characters. At times, the mystery was a lot gentler and quieter than other novels, but I quite enjoyed this. As a reader of lots of crime and mystery, and lots of young adult, it can be interesting to see how different people take on the themes and what they do with them. And what makes a mystery stand out is different for everyone.

It certainly was a quieter take than what people might expect from crime or mystery, something that is a bit more subtle. Or a bit more thoughtful and interior. There’s no distinct crime or murder plot, and many of the crimes talked about had occurred prior to the novel. This made it fit in with the quieter sense of mystery I got from this story, and I did love all the music, TV, and movie references. This made the novel work well, and gave readers a sense of nostalgia as well as something to connect with.

Return to Sender is a novel that bridges mystery and coming-of-age novels, and in bringing both aspects together, I felt that it would be a great novel to get teens interested in mystery or something a little bit different to what they might have read before. It’s also a good book for people who love reading, with a touch of nostalgia woven throughout with the letters that can make adult readers recall those times, and teens learn more about the late 1990s or early 2000s. It has something for everyone, and touches on issues like domestic violence, dealing with familial death, and isolation from the community you depend on.

At its heart, this is a novel about friendship and being there for the people you care about. Helping them with the things in their life that are hard or not going the way they hoped. It did take time for the mystery about August to build, and I think this was effective. It was one of those books where the slow-burn mystery made the story work well, where things needed to build up. It was cleverly done, and slow at times but I feel like we need books that deal with things slowly sometimes in a world where crime and mystery always seem fast-paced. It’s nice to have a bit of a break from the hectic mysteries, and this one is a good book as well.