Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #1700 in Books
• Published on: 2008-06-12
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 448 pages

Review
"* 'Barclay is the master' Wall Street Journal. * 'If you liked Harlan Coben, you'll love Linwood Barclay' Peter Robinson. * 'Utterly riveting. It will grab you on page one and won't let you go until the final, stunning conclusion' Tess Gerritsen."

Review
"a fast-moving roller-coaster of a read" (Emma Lee-Potter DAILY EXPRESS )

"Barclay's enjoyably creepy tale...certainly keeps one turning the pages" (TIMES )

Alex Gordon, Peterborough Evening Telegraph
"This is the thriller equivalent of shooting down a sheet of ice clinging to a bobsleigh as it slews round tricky corners and hurtles to a climax."

Customer Reviews

No, It's Not Magic!
'Gone without a trace' says the blurb on the front cover, but believe me, this novel is by no means magic! Didn't read any reviews before buying or reading, so started with an open mind. Good start and enjoyed it until around half way, then I started to pick holes in it. A 14-year-old (Cynthia)has a run-in with her parents one evening and goes to bed - drunk; she wakes next morning in an empty house. It transpires that her parents and brother have disappeared and 25 years later the mystery remains unsolved. Cynthia is now married to Terry and they have a young daughter, but the effects of the events all those years ago live on. Then strange things start happening and even Terry starts to have doubts about what really happened that night. I was thinking what a very good tale this was, but as the story unfolds it starts to lose its feasibility and there's a lot of unneccessary 'simple' narrative that made me impatient. I quite liked the way the author interspersed the chapters with dialogue from a source outside the family, by way of introducing the reader to the villains. Having worked out the possible plot before these dialogues started, I was still left with the question: 'Why was Cynthia left behind?', so that gave me the impetus to continue reading, plus the hope that perhaps I was entirely wrong! So to sum up: no surprises - just an OK novel.

Poor plot and not very well written
This book had the feel of a B-film throughout. The writing created very little tension and the plot, when all was revealed, was disappointing bordering on the ridiculous. There was considerable reliance on coincidence (such as the meeting in the shopping mall, two characters of almost identical appearance in a photo, boxes of momentoes which acted as clues, the school girl who just happened to be linked to the gangster ex-boyfriend, and the head who happened to be a family friend for 25 years etc, etc...), and characters acting in a rather contrived and unlikely manner, eg the homicidal headteacher and the ex-boyfriend turned gangster. All together a rather contrived plot requiring some rather unbelievable behaviour to make it all fit together. The writing style spun it all out into something of a shaggy dog story. It took some time to engage me, but I did manage to finish it just to see what the mystery was all about. As you can see the journey wasn't worth it!

Just Ghastly...
I'm surprised this was ever published, it's just that bad. The characters are paper thin, this could be forgiven if the story was compelling or the writing was good. Lets face it from the synopsis you would be led to thinking it has some potential. Do not be fooled.
I really struggled to pick it up and read, and gave up half way through. I could no longer tollerate the way it was written. The author frequently repeats himself, for instance "Coming back into the harbour I saw a short black woman in a pair of jeans and a leather jacket standing at the end of the dock as we came back into the harbour" ... come on, would you even have passed GCSE english writing like that?
Before you part with your cash ask yourself if you could put up with something so poor.