Someone YOU KNOW.
Twists galore, a gripping race against time, and police characters you'll love - if you were addicted to Broadchurch and Line of Duty, then CLOSE TO HOME is for you.
How can a child go missing without a trace?
Last night, 8-year-old Daisy Mason disappeared from her parents' summer party. No one in the quiet suburban street saw anything - or at least that's what they're saying.
DI Adam Fawley is trying to keep an open mind. But he knows that nine times out of ten, it's someone the victim knew.
That means someone is lying.
And that Daisy's time is running out...
Comment: I brought this book by impulse from the library. I knew some people I know had read and liked it, but I had no expectation about it before starting.
The Masons are having a small party in their backyard and it's hours before they realize Daisy, their 8 year old, is missing. The police starts an investigation and the parents appeal on TV but the more time passes by, everyone knows Daisy's chances are fewer and fewer. However, as the police starts connecting the dots, some weird details start to come to light. Are the parents telling the whole truth? Did someone see something they didn't tell? Was Daisy in danger before this party begun? And what is the Masons other child, Leo, hiding? Time does not wait for Daisy, but is the truth closer to home than anyone would believe?
I liked reading this novel. It was an easy, fluid read and the story grabbed me completely. I had never tried anything by this author but now I feel compelled to read the next story in this series, for it seems this is the first book in a series featuring the main police detective, Adam Fawley.
The plot is quite simple, young Daisy is missing and all of those who were at the party claim they had seen her running around with the other kids, but as the police investigates, we realize it wasn't like this after all. Of course, everyone is a suspect, and I did have my own theory but I never imagined the actual road this plot takes towards the end. I will say the author was quite imaginative, even though there is one detail that I felt was a bit hard to accept. Not that it cannot be so, but it isn't easy to accept it from a social POV.
Of course, the first people to be investigated are the parents, as any crime series viewer can attest, the closer family members are always somehow suspects. At first, some behavior seemed to suggest a certain status and personality, but it turns out these people have secrets and as we unravel them, they are revealed to be very different people from what they seemed, and I usually like these kinds of plots if the evolution/development is well established, has a recognizable pattern. I like it when there's some depth and psychological justification for the characters to act a certain way.
The police members were also captivating to follow, and not only because they seemed to interested in following protocol and in doing things properly. I also liked the hints at their individual personalities and backgrounds. One or two seem to have their quirks and/or secretive past which I assume will be handy as the series progress, but they seemed genuinely good people, without any weird or dark secrets that make them too distant or aloof to be likable. I hope things continue on this course in the next book.
I will share I never picture the actual resolution for this novel. This isn't the most complex investigation I've read about nor is this one of those intricate plots with lots of twists and elaborated webs of elements that we are supposed to be wowed. I liked it that the police investigated things in a believable manner and reached their conclusions in a way I think made sense, but this did happen as the secrets come to light, one by one. Still, the end was not what I imagined, and it made one or two scenes feel very differently, when I went back to re-read. Very clever without it being too brainy.
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