***************2 AND A HALF STARS***************

Each person holds the key to part of a story about a murder/missing person that happened 17 years ago. With all of them having their own secrets, and problems to deal with it isn't easy. We follow mainly three character Megan, Ray, and Broome as they try, and make sense of what happened all those years ago.

The book follows more than just these three main characters. It's a first person narrative but you follow many different characters, delving into the thought and feelings of many other characters, and I'm starting to really enjoy this kind of style. It's simply written but that doesn't always mean a bad thing.

Okay, so this book is a difficult one for me, if I had stopped reading it, like I had wanted to do quite a few times earlier on in the book, I probably would have given it a very low mark, and a not-so-good review. Now, I'm in two minds. There are things I liked: I like the love between the characters, it was real, not always reciprocated - whether they loved each other, or not. It showed that men love too, despite all the sh*t that is out there on the net, and media. I find that quite refreshing. I also liked how the awareness of life, how we don't always have a choice as much as it seems like we do, and that no matter how bad someone can seem they still have feelings, a caring side to them. Even though the mystery isn't completely a radical one, most crimes aren't are they, and I was fooled. How I missed it I do not know, I was on the right path, but I guess I got swayed by too many of Harlan's twists. I also like how he incorporated so many different types of people, at least different as in women, race, etc., although I do wish there were more varying characters when it came to what they thought.

Things I didn't like: I found it difficult to get into the book at first, it wasn't that it was difficult to read, it was down to me not feeling connected, or liking most of the characters. I also felt a lot of the opinions as very similar - men don't share one brain - and I kept thinking 'whatever', 'what a f*cking loads of shit', etc. Though as I kept reading it the book redeems itself, not fully, but it made a big difference to my opinion by finishing the book. Got kind of sick of the excuses, and blaming of others: men can't help themselves, it's in their DNA, etc. I don't hear that a lot about women. ;) Then again, we all have our excuses don't we, and I can only hope that this was used as sarcasm, but I'm not sure it was.

Overall, I found this book a decent read. You might enjoy his other books, or only this one, not sure really, the opinions seem to vary when I read other reviews. If you didn't like this book read another one of his, as I have noticed other reviewers saying his other books were different. I think the hardback is a bit pricey, but no one really buys full price nowadays, at least I hope they don't.