Never Look Away - Softcover

Barclay, Linwood

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0553591746 ISBN 13: 9780553591743

Publisher: Dell, 2011

Synopsis

"The best thriller I've read in five years."--Stephen King

A warm summer Saturday. An amusement park. David Harwood is glad to be spending some quality time with his wife and their four-year-old son. But what begins as a pleasant family outing turns into a nightmare after an inexplicable disappearance. A frantic search only leads to an even more shocking and harrowing turn of events. Until this terrifying moment, David Harwood is just a small-town reporter in need of a break. Now the only thing he cares about is restoring his family. Desperate for any clue, David dives into his own investigation--and into a web of lies and deceit. For with every new piece of evidence he uncovers, David finds more questions--and moves ever closer to a shattering truth.

Praise for Never Look Away

"Outstanding . . . The tension mounts. . . . The surprising twists and appealing characters rank this among the author's best."--Publishers Weekly (starred review)

"The writing is crisp; the twists are jolting and completely unexpected."--Stephen King, Entertainment Weekly

"Mr. Barclay can flawlessly assume the voice of a small-town American dad."--The New York Times

"Plenty of surprises and twists."--Seattle Post-Intelligencer

About this title

Review:

There are several nightmares shared by parents, principally involving the disappearance of their children. It is, of course, the job of novelists who deal in suspense to utilise these fears, and that is precisely what Linwood Barclay does in Never Look Away, which is typically mesmerising fare from a writer who knows how to play readers like a musician plays an instrument. In the new book, journalist David Harwood takes his wife and baby son out for the day to a New York amusement park, but while he is buying ice cream, his wife runs to him in a panic and tells him that their child, Ethan, has disappeared. The distressed couple separates to look for their son. When Harwood gives chase to a man with a pushchair, he finds his son unharmed. But to his horror, he discovers that his wife has now disappeared. Harwood is deeply worried, for a variety of reasons -- his wife has been suffering from depression, and his fear is that she has taken some ill-advised -- and irrevocable -- action. But on investigation, it is discovered that surveillance cameras give no indication that she was ever in the rollercoaster park with her husband.

To some degree, the best crime novelists (and Linwood Barclay is certainly among their number) are well aware that most of the classic plots have been utilised again and again. Certainly, the sudden disappearance of a loved one, and a search for them in the face of suspicion and distrust (usually based on the fact that proof cannot be produced that the missing person was ever in a given place) is a particularly familiar plot; anyone who has seen the film (directed by Terence Fisher) So Long at the Fair will be familiar with it. But the real question is whether or not something fresh and dynamic can be done with such material, and Barclay admirers will not be surprised to learn that is precisely what he's done here. There are other elements involved (including a businessman working in private prisons who has been bribing local officials, as well as the fact that one of Harwood's wife’s colleagues at work has also vanished), and it is this juggling of a variety of elements that makes Never Look Away such a compelling experience. --Barry Forshaw

Review:

"The best thriller I've read in five years."--Stephen King

"Outstanding . . . The tension mounts. . . . The surprising twists and appealing characters rank this among the author's best."--Publishers Weekly (starred review)

"The writing is crisp; the twists are jolting and completely unexpected."--Stephen King, Entertainment Weekly

"Mr. Barclay can flawlessly assume the voice of a small-town American dad."--The New York Times

"Plenty of surprises and twists."--Seattle Post-Intelligencer

About this edition

• Publisher: Dell
• Publication date: 2011
• ISBN 10: 0553591746
• ISBN 13: 9780553591743
• Binding: Mass Market Paperback
• Number of pages: 528