The Missing: A Thriller

In 1984, a woman is strangled in the woods around Belham, Massachusetts, the killer is unexpectedly seen by three teenage girls. He later tracks down the teenagers and kills two of them, but the third one (Darby McCormick) barely manages to escape his vengeful wrath. That incident haunts Darby for the rest of her life and is one of the primary reasons that she becomes a crime-scene investigator for the Boston Police Department.

Shift to the present day and we find Darby is working hard and enjoying her life. Then she is assigned to work a new case that involves a teenage girl being forcibly taken from her home by an unknown killer. While working the crime scene, Darby finds one of the victims hiding beneath the porch of a recent show more victim's house and soon discovers that the killer has done this many times before. What Darby doesn't realize is that "The Traveler" is back in town and that he has his eyes dead-set on her. He wants the one that got away and will stop at nothing to get what he wants.

This is a fast paced thriller that will keep you turning the page and wanting more long after the book is finished. Darby McCormick is a down to earth, real protagonist with whom most readers can readily relate. show less

I loved this book. The action started immediately and did not stop until the very end. The twists and turns gripped you until the very end. I also found myself really enjoying Darby's character. Her feelings and emotions are very realistic.

The Missing
4 Stars

Synopsis
In 1984, three young girls witness an attack on a young woman in the woods and become the target of a serial killer. Only one , Darby McCormick, survives. Years later, Darby is a forensic investigator called to the scene of a teenage abduction. As the evidence piles up, Darby finds herself tracking a psychopathic serial killer known only as the Traveler and soon comes face-to-face with the terror from her nightmares.

Review
A well-written, fast paced and intricate thriller.

While the serial killer plot is not that original (reminiscent of Patterson's Kiss the Girls), there are some excellent twists that keep you turning the pages. There are also sufficient clues to figure out the killer's identity, and as such it show more is not that much of a surprise. There is, however, one more unexpected twist right at the end.

The characters are well-developed and likeable, especially the heroine. So often, female investigators come across as cold and humorless but that is not the case for Darby McCormick. The forensic details are interesting and never become excessively technical.

The story is well-crafted but not nearly as creepy as I though it would be. For a truly disturbing, lock all your doors read, I recommend Fear Itself by Jonathan Nasaw. There are also several glaring editing errors in the hardcover copy that tend to distract from the overall flow.

All in all, an entertaining thriller and I will definitely be continuing with the series. show less

The book begins brilliantly with the portrayal of the CSI's past. The reader is drawn to believe that author wants to flesh out the character(The heroine in a lead role ..) before coming to the actual case, It is only much later in the book that one finally understands the relationship between the CSI's past traumatic experience and the current case.

The book is amazingly written with surprises at every turn, and one has to keep turning the page with much anticipation as you are literally not prepared for what happens next.

The author has chosen to portray a complex blend of emotions that one faces when a person is faced with tragedy. Here the heroine watches as her mother fades away to cancer, tries to find the link between the killer show more and the missing women and the raving, emancipated woman that was discovered, all the while carrying the baggage of her past experience and brush with murder.

"He came for me, not for her"

Read When: You want your heart pounding and when you want a quality read. show less

A few years ago I read and much liked this author's Deviant Ways. How amazing, I thought, that the prominent science journalist could write such an effective, original -- and, as I recall, pretty darned sexy -- thriller. So I bought this one. Much disappointed by it -- it's the standard tale of the sassy female investigator, here a Boston cop, who's on the trail of the serial killer who wrecked her childhood and now seems to have started up again, threatening her once more, imprisons his victims in an underground labyrinth, proves to be the uptight FBI asshole supposedly investigating the case, ya-de-ya-da -- I checked up and discovered there are two Chris Mooneys, and this is the other one. I can't help feeling I've been the victim of show more a bait-and-switch. From here on I'll stick with the nonfictional CM. Deviant Ways was good, though: let me not take that away from this author.

Meanwhile we have this mensurational nightmare, proof that Atria don't bother copyediting:

. . . near the bottom of the floor was a rectangular-sized hole . . . (p307) show less

I finally finished The Missing - I found I couldn't read it during the work week as it was a bit too creepy for just before bed, and I kept forgetting threads of the story when I could only read in snippets. But when I was able to settle into it, I really enjoyed it. Still kind of creepy, especially the parts told from the perspective of the killer...

Great characters and a plot with a few twists result in a fast-paced thriller that was an enjoyable read.