A tiny, continuously-shifting island off the coast of Cornwall has a huge part to play in Tim Weaver’s latest David Raker book, the 15th in the series to feature the former journalist turned seeker of the lost – published almost 16 years to the day that Chasing the Dead made its debut.
Porthtreno is home to the tiny hamlet of St Petroc, where 150 years ago, five houses were ambitiously built on a slope amid the dunes – homes that were quickly abandoned due to the ever-moving sands that soon threatened to engulf them. Ruins of the properties still stand today and the place is full of secrets… not least, what happened to three women who went there to make a documentary more than a decade ago and were never seen again.
It’s a mystery that has haunted Raker ever since he covered the story as a reporter, and one that will demand centre stage as The Lost Women progresses. But back to the present, where he is taken on by famous actress Ellie Snyder after her husband Preston Stewart disappears from a private hospital after having surgery on his face. CCTV shows no sign of him leaving in a conventional fashion – so how did a man still drugged up after his operation just vanish? Who has taken him and why?
Ah, but that would be telling. As fans of this author know all too well, there is no simple explanation. Time to settle back for a most enjoyable, intriguing and ingenious ride.
Raker brings in his sporadic sidekick Colm Healy, a former cop who has spent time in jail and is trying to rebuild a relationship with his family. Healy is also haunted by the past and for him and Raker, that past is about to rear its ugly head. Because the search for Stewart is destined to take them right back to places they’ve tried hard to forget – and in the background, someone is deftly pulling the strings; someone they never, ever, wanted to see again.
There are three stories intertwined here, and in addition to a to-ing and fro-ing of timelines there is also a clock ticking in the background. It has just 48 hours to run and the minutes and seconds sliding by add to the tension and keep the pages turning at pace. Probably best to cancel all plans and turn off the phone – this one is about to take over your every waking hour until you reach the final full stop.
It’s one of those occasions where I kept stopping at the end of a chapter and reluctantly walking away in the hope of making the experience last a little bit longer. It proved futile though, because as the story gathers pace you just have to know what’s coming next.
There’s a wonderfully off-kilter sense of place throughout this book, so well portrayed that you almost expect to shake the Cornish sand from its pages. This is Weaver at the top of his game, and although Raker and Healy are the movers and shakers as always, the mysterious island of Porthtreno tries its best to upstage them – and comes close to succeeding.
Newcomers to this series will find The Lost Women works as an excellent standalone, but the Raker books are addictive, and making a date with previous releases The Dead Tracks and Vanished will offer some insight into the back story. Meanwhile, fully fledged fans will now be waiting with bated breath for the next in this series. Sometimes these crime authors can be so darned sneaky – I’m looking at you, Tim Weaver!
A new mother vanishes in Five Days Missing by Caroline Corcoran, reviewed here.
Michael Joseph
Print/Kindle/iBook
£7.99
CFL Rating: 5 Stars
