Darkest Fear: A Novel - Softcover

Coben, Harlan

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0440235391 ISBN 13: 9780440235392

Publisher: Dell, 2001

Synopsis

Edgar Award-winner Harlan Coben brings us his most astonishing—and deeply personal—novel yet. And it all begins when Myron Bolitar's ex tells him he's a father ... of a dying thirteen-year-old boy.

Myron never saw it coming. A surprise visit from an ex-girlfriend is unsettling enough. But Emily Downing's news brings him to his knees. Her son Jeremy is dying and needs a bone-marrow transplant—from a donor who has vanished without a trace. Then comes the real shocker: The boy is Myron's son, conceived the night before her wedding to another man.

Staggered by the news, Myron plunges into a search for the missing donor. But finding him means cracking open a dark mystery that involves a broken family, a brutal kidnapping spree, and the FBI. Somewhere in the sordid mess is the donor who disappeared. And as doubts emerge about Jeremy's true paternity, a child vanishes, igniting a chain reaction of heartbreaking truth and chilling revelation.

About this title

Review:

Myron Bolitar's father's recent heart attack brings Myron smack into a midlife encounter with issues of adulthood and mortality. And if that's not enough to turn his life upside down, the reappearance of his first serious girlfriend is. The basketball star turned sports agent, who does a little detecting when business is slow, is saddened by the news that Emily Downing's 13-year-old son is dying and desperately needs a bone marrow transplant; even if she did leave him for the man who destroyed his basketball career, he wouldn't wish tsuris like that on anyone. And he's not at all interested in getting involved with Emily again, not even to track down the one mysterious donor who may be able to save the boy. But when Myron learns that Jeremy Downing is his own son, conceived the night before Emily and Greg Downing married, he embarks on a search for someone who disappeared a lifetime ago. And what he finds leads him to a powerful family determined to keep an old secret, a disgraced reporter who may have plagiarized a novel to create a serial killer, a very interested FBI agent, and a missing child.

This is the seventh outing in a series that's been gaining in popularity since Bolitar's first appearance, in Harlan Coben's Deal Breaker. Myron's a bit of a baby, but he's not afraid to get rough when the situation calls for it, he's eminently likable, and his heart's in the right place. The fireworks are supplied by his friend and partner, Win, who really deserves a series of his own, and Esperanza, the lesbian wrestler-lawyer who has finally talked Myron into making her a partner in the business. Like Coben's other Bolitar novels, she's worth every penny. --Jane Adams

From the Publisher:

6 1.5-hour cassettes

About this edition

• Publisher: Dell
• Publication date: 2001
• ISBN 10: 0440235391
• ISBN 13: 9780440235392
• Binding: Mass Market Paperback
• Number of pages: 352