Darkest Fear: A Novel - Softcover

Coben, Harlan

4.07

27,815 ratings by Goodreads

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0440235391 ISBN 13: 9780440235392

Publisher: Dell, 2001

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Edgar Award-winner Harlan Coben brings us his most astonishing—and deeply personal—novel yet. And it all begins when Myron Bolitar's ex tells him he's a father ... of a dying thirteen-year-old boy.

Myron never saw it coming. A surprise visit from an ex-girlfriend is unsettling enough. But Emily Downing's news brings him to his knees. Her son Jeremy is dying and needs a bone-marrow transplant—from a donor who has vanished without a trace. Then comes the real shocker: The boy is Myron's son, conceived the night before her wedding to another man.

Staggered by the news, Myron plunges into a search for the missing donor. But finding him means cracking open a dark mystery that involves a broken family, a brutal kidnapping spree, and the FBI. Somewhere in the sordid mess is the donor who disappeared. And as doubts emerge about Jeremy's true paternity, a child vanishes, igniting a chain reaction of heartbreaking truth and chilling revelation.

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Review:

Darkest Fear represents an interesting transition between Coben's comparatively lightweight and formulaic early novels and his more recent, nervier and darker novels such as Tell No One and Gone for Good. It is part of the series dealing with the misadventures of Myron Bolitar, sports agent and occasional investigator, but this time Myron has more than the convenience of his clients on his mind. An old girlfriend turns up with the revelation that her son is dying for a bone-marrow transplant--and that the son is his. Myron has always had an overdeveloped sense of personal responsibility and this time it goes into overdrive. He, and his efficiently violent friend Win, find themselves involved with one of the richest and most secretive families in America, with a particularly brutal serial kidnapper and murderer and with the FBI on one of its off days.

Coben takes his wise-cracking series hero and puts him in real physical and emotional jeopardy--the book is impressive, and a decisive break with the formula he had established earlier. After this, gloomier and more dangerous books were inevitable, and protagonists less fundamentally cheerful than the ebullient Myron. --Roz Kaveney

Review:

MAGAZINES 'Hilarious and bursting with suspense, Darkest Fear is also an exceptionally moving novel. Buy it for your loved ones and watch the sparks fly.'WATERSTONE'S QUARTERLY MAGAZINE 'Coben looks set to follow up the bestselling success of previous works with the latest in a series centred on Myron Bolitar.'GOOD BOOK GUIDE 'Coben is on top form here...'WATERSTONE'S ENIGMA Jude Davies Plus review in:FHMSHERLOCK magazine NATIONAL PRESS REVIEWS:DAILY TELEGRAPHTHE MIRRORDAILY MAILTHE GUARDIAN (Chris Petit)MORNING STAR REGIONAL PRESS REVIEWS:'It's riveting stuff, with some of the sharpest dialogue you'll read in a thriller. In this case, the hype is an understatement - this is in a class of its own.'DAILY RECORD 'Coben is supremely accomplished at taking us from giggling to sniffing back the tears'MANCHESTER EVENING NEWS PETERBOROUGH EVENING TELEGRAPH - lead review *****ABERDEEN EVENING EXPRESSCUMBRIA NEWS &STARHARTLEPOOL MAILNORWICH EVENING NEWSSWINDON GAZETTE & HERALDMALMESBURY GAZETTE & HERALDDEVIZES GAZETTE & HERALDLEICESTER MERCURYLINCOLNSHIRE ECHOTHE JOURNAL (NEWCASTLE UPON TYNE)SENTINEL SUNDAYBLACKPOOL GAZETTESUNDERLAND ECHOIRISH NEWSSLOUGH EXPRESSYORK EVENING PRESS - Simon RitchieHAM &

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