Never Coming Back

May 26, 2014
British author Weaver makes his U.S. debut with this darkly atmospheric mystery, the fourth to feature missing persons investigator David Raker (after Vanished). While on holiday to his childhood home in Devon, Raker agrees to help his high school girlfriend, Emily Kane, find her family. Ten months earlier, Emily entered the unlocked house of her sister, Carrie Ling, and discovered the TV on, dinner cooking on the stove, and the dog roaming around—but no sign of Carrie, husband Paul, or daughters Annabel and Olivia. Raker’s quest begins sluggishly, but the plot picks up speed after he learns that Carrie stumbled on the existence of a shadowy organization with sinister past associations. Weaver ramps up the tension through a series of well-executed twists. While Raker isn’t a particularly sympathetic character, his drive, fueled by a sense of responsibility for the missing, is infectious. Readers who brave the slow start will find their patience well rewarded. Agent: Camilla Wray, Darley Anderson Literary (U.K.).

June 15, 2014
Weaver, author of the popular U.K.-based David Raker series, brings his missing person investigator to American readers for the first time.Raker was once a journalist but now devotes his life to investigating disappearances. His present case involves a missing family, Paul and Carrie Ling and their two daughters. Emily, Carrie's sister, found the Lings' home deserted, dinner still cooking on the stove, the dog wandering around and milk spilled on the floor. No one, including police, has seen them since. Emily contacts the self-styled investigator-her old flame-and enlists his help in finding her sister. Raker, recovering from wounds suffered in a previous case, soon discovers himself knee-deep in a conspiracy to quiet one of the family members, and he follows the trail from an English fishing village to the bright lights of Las Vegas and back to England. Along the way, he encounters another old friend, a rich and successful man and a shadowy figure who seems hellbent on eliminating witnesses-but Raker isn't sure why. Eventually he finds his answers, but not without accumulating enough dead bodies to fill a spacious morgue and so many plot twists that readers will wonder why the bad guys didn't kill him at the beginning and be done with it. Weaver's a good enough writer; his stories brim with atmosphere and plentiful action. His use of disconnected flashbacks proves disconcerting, however, and his writing is heavily invested in single-sentence paragraphs, which lends a breathless, artificial urgency to even the most mundane task or rumination.A promising debut that could have been better with defter editing.

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June 15, 2014

Five months after a near-fatal knife attack, David Raker, 42, is recuperating in a village in Devon. Formerly an investigative reporter, he now specializes in finding missing persons. When Emily, a former girlfriend from his youth, asks him to locate her sister, Carrie, he is hooked. Carrie, her husband, and two children vanished from their home, leaving their meal cooking, the table set, and the dog waiting. Two mysterious deaths may have some connection to a group of superrich businessmen shepherded by a frightening fix-things watcher. As the body count rises, Raker feels increasingly threatened as other childhood friends become involved. Raker depends on empathy and intuition; like a Dick Francis hero, he works alone and suffers stoically. The varied characters are sharply drawn, the tension and suspense are palpable, and the plot twists both in England and Las Vegas rush to a shocking ending. VERDICT This is best-selling British author Weaver's fourth thriller featuring Raker, but the first to be published here. Surely we will see more of Weaver's work available in the States soon. [See Prepub Alert, 1/10/14.]--Roland Person, formerly with Southern Illinois Univ. Lib., Carbondale

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