Never Look Away: A Thriller [Hardcover]

Linwood Barclay (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: March 9, 2010

"Where has Linwood Barclay been all my life? His is the best thriller I've read in five years. Once I was 30 pages in, I literally couldn't put it down. The writing is crisp; the twists are jolting and completely unexpected. Think 'Rebecca' and you'll be in the right neighborhood."  - Stephen King


In this tense, mesmerizing thriller by Linwood Barclay, critically acclaimed author of Fear the Worst and Too Close to Home, a man’s life unravels around him when the unthinkable strikes.
 
A warm summer Saturday. An amusement park. David Harwood is glad to be spending some quality time with his wife, Jan, and their four-year-old son. But what begins as a pleasant family outing turns into a nightmare after an inexplicable disappearance. A frantic search only leads to an even more shocking and harrowing turn of events.
  
Until this terrifying moment, David Harwood is just a small-town reporter in need of a break. His paper, the Promise Falls Standard, is struggling to survive. Then he gets a lead that just might be the answer to his prayers: a potential scandal involving a controversial development project for the outskirts of this picturesque upstate New York town. It’s a hot-button issue that will surely sell papers and help reverse the Standard’s fortunes, but strangely, David’s editors keep shooting it down.

Why?
 
That’s a question no longer at the top of David’s list. Now the only thing he cares about is restoring his family. Desperate for any clue, David dives into his own investigation—and into a web of lies and deceit. For with every new piece of evidence he uncovers, David finds more questions—and moves ever closer to a shattering truth.
 

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Amazon Best Books of the Month, March 2010 With a storyline that's wound tighter than a rattlesnake's coil, author Linwood Barclay returns to play upon our deepest fears with Never Look Away. Journalist David Harwood is left only with questions after a family outing becomes a terrifying nightmare in the mere blink of an eye. Someone, it would seem, is out to get him, and when suspicious evidence labels him a “person of interest” in a mysterious disappearance, the unassuming Harwood is forced to bare his teeth in pursuit of the truth. Fans of Fear the Worst, Too Close to Home, and No Time for Goodbye should already know the drill: Barclay refuses to grant readers any respite with gut-wrenching plot twists that keep firing until the final page. But those unfamiliar with his work would be wise to clear their calendars for this engaging non-stop thriller. --Dave Callanan

Amazon Exclusive: Linwood Barclay on Never Look Away

Years ago, when I worked on the city desk for The Toronto Star, every once in a while someone would phone in with a hot tip. Something they’d heard from a friend of a friend. The story was that children were being spirited away from a local theme park. Grabbed, disguised, thrown into a van and driven away so fast their parents hadn’t even noticed they were gone yet.

And the kicker was, the story was being suppressed because the theme park owners didn’t want bad publicity.

There was never, ever anything to it. I’d worked in the news business long enough to know that when a kid goes missing. That story gets out. Big time.

Our theme park was not the only one where this urban myth played out. I’d heard the same story about a number of big attractions. But never with any real names attached. It always happened to the boyfriend of someone’s cousin’s brother’s boss.

But the story stayed with me just the same. I started playing around with it in my head. I thought, okay, let’s start with the myth, but then let’s do something entirely different. Someone’s going to disappear, all right, but not the person you’re expecting...

As I began working out the storyline for my new thriller, Never Look Away, the amusement park scene became a way in to a very different kind of tale for me. One about secrets, about past, hidden lives, about how sometimes the people we’re closest to are the ones we know the least. One significant way in which it differs from my previous novels is that it is not told entirely in first person. This time, there were things I had to keep from my protagonist that the reader just had to know.

That time on the city desk was part of more than 30 years I spent working in newspapers. It was a period in which papers mattered a great deal. They still do, but it’s hardly news to point out they’re facing tough times, a perfect storm of changing technology meeting harsh economic realities. So when it came to deciding what that protagonist would do for a living, I decided to make him a reporter at a small daily that’s more concerned with maintaining revenues than breaking scandals, especially if breaking them will hurt the bottom line. (I like to point out, I never encountered anything like that at The Star.)

I was well into writing this novel when Michael Connelly’s terrific novel The Scarecrow came out, which is also set against the backdrop of a newspaper in decline. I suspect these will not be the only two novels to explore--either in depth or in a tangential way--the significant changes this institution is going through.

Another urban myth that used to get called into the paper now and again was that some unscrupulous developer was building houses so cheaply, someone’s piano went right through the living room floor. We never found that house, but there might still be a murder mystery in that story, especially if there was some poor bastard in that basement. --Linwood Barclay

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From Publishers Weekly

Starred Review. Bestseller Barclay's outstanding thriller, his fourth stand-alone after Fear the Worst, opens with what should be a happy family outing—a trip to an amusement park. Shortly after newspaper reporter David Harwood; his wife, Jan; and their four-year-old son, Ethan, arrive at Five Mountains in upper New York State, Ethan disappears. A frantic Jan goes to find security, while David soon locates Ethan nearby asleep in his stroller. But now Jan is missing. What's more, the park has no record of selling her a ticket, and she doesn't show up on any security video. Nor is she at home in Promise Falls, N.Y. While the police suspect David killed Jan and concocted the park abduction story, he uses his reporting skills to dig into his wife's past and learns he never really knew her. The tension mounts as Barclay skillfully shows how even the most innocent action can seem suspicious. The surprising twists and appealing characters rank this among the author's best. 5-city author tour. (Mar.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 432 pages
• Publisher: Delacorte Press; 1ST edition (March 9, 2010)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 055380717X
• ISBN-13: 978-0553807172
• Product Dimensions: 6.4 x 1.4 x 9.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.7 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (109 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #329,715 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Linwood Barclay is a former columnist for The Toronto Star and the author of several critically acclaimed novels, including Too Close to Home and No Time for Goodbye, a #1 Sunday Times (UK) bestseller. He lives near Toronto with his wife.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

76 of 78 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Do you really know the ones you love?, February 13, 2010

By 

Denise Crawford "DC" (Missouri, USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: Never Look Away: A Thriller (Hardcover)

(What's this?)

I have read all of Linwood Barclay's back-list and I must say that this one is better than the last two and I'm relieved that he's pulled back a little with the unbelievable endings and returned to writing a taut mystery thriller that is both fast paced and suspenseful. I found both Fear the Worst: A Thriller and Too Close to Home: A Thriller to be just way too over the top and am glad that Barclay has returned to a style similar to the one used with what I consider to be my favorite of his novels, No Time for Goodbye. Yeah, all his books require a bit of suspension of disbelief at the scenarios, but the main character -- almost consistently a family man with a wife and child -- is usually a sympathetic protagonist and one whom you want to see get to the bottom of the mystery.

In this novel, newspaper reporter David Harwood is investigating what might be corruption with regard to a new privatized prison that is being hawked as the next best thing for the small town of Promise Falls, New York. He's married to Jan and they have a 4 year old son named Ethan. One day, while they're at an amusement park, one of them disappears!! David races from place to place to figure out what is going on and, although several subplots are brewing simultaneously, the energy and the narrative keep the reader glued to the pages. Even though the reader knows what is happening and why, it's a fun romp to the end.

If you like a good mystery thriller, you'll enjoy this one. Recommend.

27 of 29 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Another winner from Barclay, February 26, 2010

By 

DWD "DWD's Reviews" (Indianapolis, IN) - See all my reviews
(TOP 1000 REVIEWER)    (VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: Never Look Away: A Thriller (Hardcover)

(What's this?)

Linwood Barclay excells are writing books in which the average middle class guy (a car salesman in Fear the Worst: A Thriller , a newspaper reporter in this book) has his whole life turned upside down and is thrust into a world of crime, violence and intrigue. His books remind me of the old-fashioned film noire style except these are quicker and have even more turns.

In "Never Look Away", David Harwood is a reporter with a wife, a son, two loving parents who babysit their son and a hot lead on signs of corruption in local government that will make an explosive story. Suddenly, his wife disappears at a local theme park and he is accused of causing her disappearance.

More problems pile on and the pressure makes David and his world crumble.

There is a point in which the reader says, "What? Even more happens to this guy?"

Does it get ridiculous?

Absolutely.

More importantly, does the story work?

Absolutely.

This is a real page turner. I found myself losing real chunks of time if I picked this book up during my morning routine. I was nearly late to work two days in a row because I had to keep reading a little bit more.

I look forward to the next one, Mr. Barclay.

12 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars "The measure of a man's real character is what he would do if he would never be found out." Unknown source, March 14, 2010

By 

michael a. draper (Guilford, CT) - See all my reviews
(TOP 500 REVIEWER)    (VINE VOICE)   

This review is from: Never Look Away: A Thriller (Hardcover)

David Harwood has been working on a story of Star Spangled Corrections, a privately run correctional corporation, wanting to build a prison in his town. David has records of payoffs of politicians but his editors delay in publishing it.

One day, David, his wife Jan, and their four year old son, Ethan, go to an amusement park. As they approach the front gate, Jan remembers something in the car and tells David she'll meet him inside. She never shows.

After alerting park officials and doing an extensive search, police are called in and after a bit begin to suspect that David did something to his wife.

Things are baffeling and the reader wonders how they could be. But the author is providing a cover for his clever plot.

David is a smypathetic character. His plight is tragic but we also witness what his wife is up to and wonder how a reporter like David can't see things more clearly. Jan is a true Machiavellian figure, out only for herself. She's totally unlikable but this is part of the author's intent so we feel worse for her husband.

The plot is magnificent. Barklay is like a master fisherman, casting lines in different spots and then reeling them back with a story that catches the reader's breath.