Val McDermid: The Vanishing Point

Val McDermid: The Vanishing Point (USA 2012)

From the Publisher:
One of the finest crime writers we have, Val McDermid's more than two dozen heart-stopping thrillers have won her international renown and a devoted following of readers across the globe. In The Vanishing Point, she kicks off a terrifying thriller with a nightmare scenario.

A young child is brazenly snatched from the security checkpoint at a busy airport while his guardian watches from the glass inspection box, helpless to prevent the abduction. But this is no ordinary kidnapping, as this is no ordinary child -- Jimmy's mother was Scarlett, a reality TV star who died tragically young from cancer. Reluctant to leave the care of her child to her troubled and unreliable family, before her death Scarlett entrusted the boy to the person she believed best able to give him a happy, stable life: her ghost writer, Stephanie Harker.

As Stephanie assists the FBI in their attempt to recover the missing boy, she reveals her history with Scarlett and Jimmy, reaching into the past to uncover the motive for the abduction. Has he been taken by his own relatives? Has he been kidnapped by Stephanie's obsessive ex-lover to teach her a lesson? Has one of Scarlett's stalkers come back to haunt them all? Or is it simply a kidnap for ransom? The final resolution confronts Stephanie with a shocking story of murder and conspiracy, and forces her to make the most difficult choice of her life, a choice that will have long-term repercussions for everyone touched by this crime.

A powerful, grippingly plotted thriller that will keep readers on the edge of their seats until the last page, The Vanishing Point showcases McDermid at the height of her talent.

Val McDermid: The Vanishing Point. Grove/Atlantic, ISBN: 9780802120526 (October, 2012), 416 p., $25.00.

Val McDermid: The Vanishing Point (UK 2012)

From the Publisher:
It's every parent's worst nightmare...
Stephanie Harker is travelling through the security gates at O'Hare airport, on her way to an idyllic holiday. Five-year-old Jimmy goes through the metal detector ahead of her. But then, in panic and disbelief, Stephanie watches as a uniformed agent leads her boy away - and she's stuck the other side of Security, hysterical with worry.

The authorities, unaware of Jimmy's existence, just see a woman behaving erratically; Stephanie is brutally wrestled to the ground and blasted with a taser gun to restrain her. And by the time she can tell them what has happened, Jimmy is long gone.

But as Stephanie tells her story to the FBI, it becomes clear that everything is not as it seems with this seeminglynormal family. What is Jimmy's background? Why would someone want to abduct him? And, with time running out, how can Stephanie get him back?

A breathtakingly rich and gripping psychological thriller, The Vanishing Point is Val McDermid's most accomplished standalone novel to date, a work of haunting brilliance.

Val McDermid: The Vanishing Point. Little, Brown, ISBN: 9781408703212 (September, 2012), 448 p., £16.99.