Before She Was Found by Heather Gudenkauf

 

This was a very disturbing  but beautifully crafted novel. At first I thought it was based on the Slender Man Stabbing incident but was totally wrong.It is about three girls, Cora, Violet and Jordyn who have a sleepover at Cora's house only to decide to do something dangerous. They had a project to report on an Urban Legend and they chose the legend of Joseph Wither. Joseph Wither disappeared a long time ago at the railroad tracks and was known to murder young girls who wandered over there. However though he kills one, the other one always disappears without a trace. The one who disappears supposedly runs away with Joseph.

Let me describe the girls. Cora is a quiet student who has an older sister who loves bullying her. Unfortunately, her sister's best friend loves to join in the fun. Violet is another silent one who has an older brother and a mom who loves to go from one man after another to the disadvantage of the kids. Now Jordyn is the evil one. She was abandoned by her parents and left with her grandfather.She bullies Cora unmercifully especially since Gabe, a boy she likes , shows an interest on Cora.She also has this deep hatred for their teacher because he has shown some concern for Cora. Since her partner in the project left town, the teacher, Mr. Dover, made her join the group of Cora and Violet.

After the sleepover, Jordyn leaves the other two and goes home and Cora ends up being badly beaten and stabbed. Violet, on the other hand is drenched with blood and is in severe shock.  She then says Joseph Wither was there.

Evil Jordyn keeps on lying and even accuses the teacher to be the Joseph Wither who appears at the railway station and stabs Cora. After several lies and having the teacher get into trouble , the truth finally comes out. Cora ,who is so vulnerable for being routinely persecuted by her sister and Jordyn, starts going to the Darknet. Here she.meets a guy online who claims to be Joseph Wither. He starts encouraging her to run away with him and being so frail and lonely  she succombs to his online charms. What she doesn't know was it was her sister and her sister's best friend who were pretending to be Joseph Wither. Her sister eventually stops but her friend doesn't. So Cora urges all of them at the sleepover to meet Joseph at the abandonded railway station. She sees a figure but it runs away. Feeling rejected she goes ballistc and stabs herself with the knife Jordyn brought and dropped. When she realizes she's not dead yet she starts slamming her face on the railways. It ends up Gabe was into this cruel treachery and she finds this out later at the hospital.

When the truth comes out, Jordyn is tried for lying and  required to check in with a parole officer and see a counselor regularly. Violet and her family moves to a different town where her mom gets a decent job. Mr. Dover, the teacher, leaves town. Cora, on the other hand, ends up in a psych ward. It was there wherein she relates the whole story of what happened. Her sister , out of guilt , was the one severely traumatized and  visits Cora regularly. Cora is slowly mending and talks about the whole incident in her journal.