In Harlan Coben’s capable hands, the familiar runaway daughter plot is revitalised and exacerbated, in a thriller replete with several truly sneaky twists and a haunting dénouement. Although Coben’s customary wit and banter is diluted — the repercussions of Simon Greene’s search for his daughter, Paige, doesn’t really allow for sass or wisecracks — Run Away is another masterful domestic thriller, and another impressive page-turner from one of my favourite writers.
When Simon, a successful Manhattan money manager, identifies his runaway college dropout (now junkie) daughter Paige playing guitar in Central Park, he approaches her, hoping to encourage her back into rehab, or at the very least a few nights away from her abusive boyfriend, Aaron. Things do not go well. Strung out on drugs, Paige barely seems to recognise her father — and their resulting confrontation results in Simon punching Aaron in the face, and becoming a viral sensation as a rich guy abusing the poor. Paige disappears, and for three months, Simon and his wife, Ingrid, hear nothing; that is until Bronx Homicide Detective Isaac Fagbenle turns up at Simon’s office, asking questions about the murder of Aaron. The Greene’s are suspects, but Paige is the obvious one — and she’s still missing. So Simon and Ingrid launch their own investigation, which brings them into the path of Chicago PI Elena Ramirez, hired to find the missing adopted son of wealthy Sebastian Thorpe III, and a murderous duo named Ash and Dee Dee, the latter of whom waxes lyrically about the Maine religious commune she belongs to. Somehow Coben manages to successfully connect these threads, building momentum until the very last page.
Fasten your seat belt for this roller-coaster ride through family hell.
ISBN: 9781780894263
Format: Paperback / softback
Pages: 352
Imprint: Century
Publisher: Cornerstone
Publish Date: 21-Mar-2019
Country of Publication: United Kingdom
Damn, Ragnar Jónasson, where have you been all my life?
“Newcomer” is the second Detective Kyochiro Kaga mystery translated from Japanese into English after “Malice“, back in 2014. Having been demoted from the Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department’s elite Homicide Division, Kaga now finds himself working in the Nihonbashi Precinct; specifically a murder in Kodenmacho, where Mineko Mitsui, a woman with seemingly no enemies, was discovered strangled in her apartment.
A few years back, Annie Proulx published Barkskins, a vast multi-generational and ecological saga that was enormous in size and scope. I adored the books for its lofty ambition — to chronicle the world’s deforestation from the perspective of two distinct bloodlines — and figured I was done with environmental novels for a while. Then came The Overstory by Powers — shortlisted for The Man Booker Prize, and loved by several of my colleagues — and lo and behold, here I am, another enormous novel about trees behind me.
After lavishing Anne Tyler’s Clock Dance with praise last year — in fact, it was named in my 
Lou Berney’s November Road was the darling crime novel of 2018 — and for good reason. It’s an unequivocally excellent book, a literary thriller set right after the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, that’s jammed with white-knuckle suspense, while offering a meditation about life and love. It’s a book connoisseurs can thrust into the hands of even the most adamant non-crime-fiction reader to demonstrate the pliability of the genre; a response to those who insist crime fiction relies solely on pyrotechnics and testosterone-bulked goons, and turn their noses up because of that assumption. November Road is a thriller with heart; with rich characters and depth; that’s fast-moving, but emotionally resonant.
Roddy Doyle’s Charlie Savage collects a whole year’s worth of hilarious, self-effacing and often poignant anecdotes, first published in the Irish Independent, about a middle-aged Dubliner reconciling with his own mortality, and the irrefutable reality of having more past than future. Or, as Charlie’s daughter puts it, “in the prime of your decline.”