One of the worst things that could happen to a parent is having a child just disappear. That is the basis for FEAR THE WORST, Linwood Barclay’s third standalone novel and a total page-turner.
Tim Blake is just your average divorced dad with a teenage daughter, whom he thinks he knows everything about. That changes one night when she does not come home. That night turns into days, sending his life in a downward spiral with worry. Tim sets up a website dedicated to his missing daughter, Sydney, hoping someone will contact him with information. He soon sets off on his own investigation, thinking the police are not doing enough.
He asks his ex-wife, who now lives with her used-car-king boyfriend and his son, whom Tim was never happy to know was living under the same roof as his daughter. Tim tries everywhere he can think of, including the hotel where Sydney worked. But no one has ever heard of her. Could it be that she lied to him? It would be so out-of-character for her.
Tim does not stop there, going to every business in the area, hoping someone might have seen Sydney, but he has no luck. Even her friends have no idea where she might be. Days take their toll on Tim, until he gets an e-mail from a woman out in Seattle who thinks she might have seen his daughter. Could this be the break he’s been hoping for?
From this point, the mystery becomes even more involved, kicking into a high gear that never slows down until the end is reached. Barclay has crafted a dark world just bubbling underneath Tim’s Connecticut suburban life. There are moments where the reader needs to take a grain of salt, especially when the heat is totally turned up — it just seems as though Tim catches a few too many breaks in the last 30 pages. But that withstanding, Barclay has enough packed up his sleeve that readers will forgive those little moments, since it all builds up to a terrific end. —Bruce Grossman
OTHER BOOKGASM REVIEWS OF THIS AUTHOR:
• LONE WOLF by Linwood Barclay
• NO TIME FOR GOODBYE by Linwood Barclay
• STONE RAIN by Linwood Barclay
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