The Missing by C.L. Taylor
4.5 stars out of 5
“When fifteen-year-old Billy Wilkinson goes missing in the
middle of the night, his mother, Claire, is distraught, blaming herself. She’s
not the only one. There isn’t a single member of Billy’s family who doesn’t
feel guilty.
But the Wilkinsons are so used to keeping secrets from one
another that it isn’t until six months later, when an appeal for information
goes horribly wrong, that the terrifying truth begins to surface.
Claire is sure of two things: Billy is still alive and her
family had nothing to do with his disappearance.
A mother’s instinct is never wrong. Or is
it?”
The Missing by C.L. Taylor is an excellent read for anyone
who enjoys a puzzle. This psychological thriller leads you down two paths
simultaneously but within two separate timelines. The main one is the story of
Claire and her family trying to deal with the disappearance of 15 year old
Billy. The other is a series of WhatsApp conversations between two unknown
parties. While it becomes clear fairly quickly that one of the WhatsApp
conversationalists is Billy and takes place in the months before he goes
missing, it is not clear who the other person is. Throughout the story I found
myself trying to fit what I knew of the other characters into the
“Conversations” to try to work out if it is one of them.
From the synopsis two things are immediately apparent – the
family has secrets and Claire’s certainty about Billy and her family’s part in
his disappearance maybe isn’t as absolute as she thought it was.
The characters in this intriguing, page-turning,
psychological thriller all have their secrets. As more details come out I found
myself changing my opinion on each of them several times, wondering what their
part in Billy’s disappearance really was. Did they or did they not do something
they are keeping to themselves that impacted on what happened? Like all of us
do they made decisions, some of which seem fairly innocuous in the beginning,
that lead them down paths they didn’t see coming. Could they have altered the
ultimate destination by making the decision to open up and not keep those
secrets? Maybe, maybe not. One thing is definite – once we make our choice and
pick a route to follow, none of us can ever go back.
If you are looking for a book that will keep you guessing,
make you think and analyse all you have learned, wondering what is vital to
working out what happened to Billy and what may be red herrings simply
highlighting how many secrets are kept, this book is one for you. This isn’t a
book where you can skip over passages thinking them unimportant or simply a
filler, because the clues you’re looking for could be anywhere but it is a book
you will want to keep reading to find out what happened. A real page turner and
one that’s hard to put down, I thoroughly enjoyed The Missing and look forward
to reading more from C.L. Taylor.
This is C.L. Taylor's third book but the first I have read. It definitely won't be the last!
