Book
Just one look
Record details
- ISBN: 9780451213204 (pbk.)
- ISBN: 0525947914 (hc.)
- ISBN: 9780525947912 (hc.)
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Physical Description:
370 p. ; 24 cm.
print - Publisher: New York : Dutton, c2004.
Search for related items by subject
| Subject: | Identity (Psychology) -- Fiction Runaway husbands -- Fiction Missing persons -- Fiction Married women -- Fiction Suburban life -- Fiction Photographs -- Fiction |
| Genre: | Crime thrillers. Domestic fiction. |
Other Formats and Editions
Show Only Available Copies
| Location | Call Number / Copy Notes | Barcode | Shelving Location | Holdable? | Status | Due Date |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Gibsons Public Library | FIC COBE (Text) | 30886000148201 | Adult Fiction Hardcover | Volume hold | Available | - |
- Booklist Reviews : Booklist Monthly Selections - #1 March 2004
/*Starred Review*/ If the trick of suspense writing is to get readers to identify so passionately with the beleaguered principal character that they disappear into the story, feeling the knife points of tension themselves, then Coben is the Houdini of the form. Coben, who has won the Trifecta of mystery writing--the Edgar, the Anthony, and the Shamus Awards--likes to burst the bubble of suburban security by having his characters' well-ordered, happy lives upended in ways that mirror readers' fears. In his four stand-alone thrillers, the past comes back to bite or haunt the protagonist, or the present vanishes in one fatal moment. In this latest excursion into the dark, a suburban mother finds one picture that does not belong in the pack of family outing photos she's just picked up. The picture, showing a group of college students, seems as if it was taken 20 years ago. One of the group looks like her husband. A girl in the group has an X drawn across her face. When Mrs. Happily Married shows the picture to her husband, he seems shaken, then leaves home. Coben ratchets up the suspense of the wife trying to find her husband with another drama, that of a serial killer in the neighborhood. A tragic accident from the woman's past intersects with her husband's secrets and the movements of the killer in ways that are satisfyingly creepy. ((Reviewed March 1, 2004)) Copyright 2004 Booklist Reviews. - Kirkus Reviews : Kirkus Reviews 2004 March #2
Suburban thriller from the prolific Coben (No Second Chance, 2002, etc.), about a perfect husband who disappears when a photo from the past shows up in the latest batch from the photomat.Perfectly in love since their romantic meeting in France 15 years earlier, Jack and Grace Lawson are living the suburban dream: Windstar, Saab, daughter, son. He makes lots of money, she makes lots of art. There is a teeny flaw. Grace limps. It's the scar she bears from the trauma she endured before the trip to France. There was this rock concert. Shots were fired. Panic. Deaths. Heroism. Cowardice. Badly mangled Grace made it out of a coma with a week or two of memory gone and a healthy dislike of big crowds. Suddenly the superperfect life she has built from the ruins has gone off the rails. Tucked in among a set of newly developed photos is a snap taken sometime in the '80s. It shows a group of young people, possibly hip for the decade, and one of the lads, while hairier and callower, is clearly Jack. The insertion could only have been at the hands of the slacker in the Kodak kiosk, but he's disappeared. And, upon viewing the photo, so has Jack, leaving Grace to ask that old reliable story-starting question: "Just who is this man I thought I knew?" Answers must be found quickly, for handsome Jack has been captured by a cold-blooded, sadistic, Korean killer and lies senseless in the boot of the stolen family minivan. Detective assistance comes from a rogue District Attorney, a wacky girlfriend, a lovelorn neighbor, a tough Jewish cop with a hole in his heart where his wife used to be, a shadowy, powerful mob guy whose son died at the rock concert, and possibly from Jimmy X, the rocker whose concert seems to have started the present subdivisional mayhem all those years ago.Tepid terrors along the way to a mildly surprising end.Agent: Aaron Priest/Aaron M. Priest Literary Agency Copyright Kirkus 2004 Kirkus/BPI Communications.All rights reserved. - Library Journal Reviews : LJ Reviews 2004 January #1
It's not bad enough that some newly developed photos include a decades-old shot of Grace's husband with a bunch of strangers; then he promptly disappears. Copyright 2003 Reed Business Information. - Library Journal Reviews : LJ Reviews 2004 May #1
In Coben's latest (after No Second Chance), a snapshot turns a dedicated wife and mother's suburban fantasy life upside down. While flipping through a set of newly developed photographs, Grace Lawson comes across an old picture of four people, one of whom resembles her husband, Jack. When she shows him the photo, he denies being the person or knowing anyone involved. Later that night, with the photo in his possession, Jack flees the house and promptly vanishes. When Grace uncovers proof that one of the strangers in the picture is now dead, her picture-perfect life starts to unravel. With each thriller, Coben just gets better and better. His latest is terrifying on several levels, offering so many questions with intricate and complex answers. The pages fly until the last piece of the puzzle falls neatly into place. Just one look, and you will be hooked. For all fiction collections. [Previewed in Prepub Alert, LJ 1/04; a Mystery Guild, Literary Guild, and BOMC main selection.] Jeff Ayers, Seattle P.L. Copyright 2004 Reed Business Information. - Publishers Weekly Reviews : PW Reviews 2004 March #5
Just one look at Coben's latest stand-alone thriller (after No Second Chance) highlights the author's customary strengths (swift pacing, strong lead characters) but also his weaknesses, including limited originality and, in this case, a plot so complicated that many final pages are devoted to sorting it out. The premise is simple enough: suburban housewife Grace Lawson collects some pictures at the local Photomat; inexplicably, one is an old print depicting her husband, Jack, with other college students; when Grace shows the photo to Jack, he drives away-and disappears. Grace's hunt for her missing husband, whom we learn has been kidnapped (but why? and Coben fans will note that the author's last novel also hinged on a kidnapped family member), sweeps her back into a nightmare she thought she'd escaped: the evening years ago when she survived a rock concert rampage, occasioned by a shooting that left many dead. Meanwhile, Eric Wu, a-dare we say?-inscrutable martial-arts killer who has snatched Jack for reasons unknown, menaces assorted folk. Eventually Grace, aided by a Gotti-like mobster whose child was killed in the rampage, gloms on to Wu, as well as on to Jack's sister, a high-powered attorney who, it turns out, is representing the guy who started the rampage by firing his gun. Only he didn't start the rampage after all, and then there's the rock star who vanished after the shooting and resultant mayhem-what's he now doing on Grace's doorstep? This is all as complicated as a thousand-piece jigsaw puzzle and about as hard to figure out, although in the midst of the murk there are some wonderful character touches. Coben can write thrillers that lift readers off their seats; this one, alas, will have them slumping. Agent, Lisa Erbach Vance at the Aaron Priest Agency. (May) Forecast: This will hit lists hard, pushed by a Today author appearance and major ad/promo, but readers looking for the kind of thrills found in No Second Chance won't be happy. Copyright 2004 Reed Business Information.
