On a beautiful July afternoon in 1981 David Umber witnesses the kidnapping of a young girl. At the same time the child's sister is struck and killed by the kidnapper's van. In the ensuing confusion the kidnappers escape and are never heard from again. No ransom demand is ever presented for the child and she (or her body) is never located. Several years later a convicted sex offender confesses to the crime and is jailed, but there is some doubt that he was the kidnapper.

The events of that July day profoundly affect David's life, his promising academic career is cut short. He marries the kidnapped child's nanny and they drift around Europe for several years before separating. Suffering depression, she commits suicide. Several years later when he is working in Prague in a dead-end job as a guide for British package tours, he is approached by a retired British policeman who wants to re-open the investigation into the kidnapping and David's wife's suicide. David reluctantly agrees, and for the next 400+ pages of the book he chases clues, is chased, beaten up and threatened with death. As he says at page 409:

"It was too good to be true. It was too alluring to be anything but a trap. And maybe it was a trap deadlier than any of those he had so far blundered into. But he had agreed to go. And he would. He could not ignore the summons. He could not resist the bait. He could not avoid the trap."

The surprise ending is saved for the very end of the book. It's a long slog to finish the book, but well worth the effort. There's an interesting parallel story about the "Junius Letters" that plays in the background. Some readers may feel that it's a meaningless distraction, but I found it interesting.

All said, this is an action-filled suspense story, with a satisfying conclusion.

Recommended. ( )

Not a bad Goddard, but it never really rises above being par-for-the-course. He's got a good game, but if you've read a few of these before, you've essentially read everything here before. Middle of the pack of the half-dozen of his I've read (so he is good enough that I keep coming back for more, eventually). ( )

Eén keer gelezen, maar dat is te lang geleden voor een goede recensie. Dus, eerst nog een keer lezen, dan horen jullie wat ik ervan vind.

Intend to release this one at the meeting on Terschelling, so will read this in the course of next week.

After a considerable time I re-read this book. This time, liked it a lot better than the first, when I compared it too much with [b:Verboden te lezen|10879478|Verboden te lezen |Robert Goddard|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1301195308s/10879478.jpg|1845145], a book by the same author. Now that I did not read them one after the other, I am able to talk about this book.

There's a lot going on in this book. Occasionally I had trouble following the leaps of thought of certain characters, how he/she came to the conclusion .... I'm not saying that everything should always be written in great detail, but because there were some unexplained things, the story lines came together very late. As a reader I'd have preferred to know some reasons / causes earlier on in the story. Most likely I would have appreciated the book more.

It is certainly not a bad book, but I have read more exciting / better books. The only scene that really stood out for me was the one near the end of the book, at the tain station. That was very well done. I won't say anything more.... ;-) ( )

Witness to a child's kidnapping doesn't know what he saw. Classic Goddard "hero" -- wandering around getting kicked and hardly knowing what's going on -- I love him! ( )

http://www.book-blog.com/2011/04/goddard-robert-sight-unseen.html ( )