Gone - Hardcover

Mo Hayder

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0593063813 ISBN 13: 9780593063811

Publisher: Bantam Press, 2010

Synopsis

On a November evening in the West Country, murder detective Jack Caffery arrives to interview the victim of a car-jacking. He’s dealt with routine car-thefts before, but in this case the car was taken by force. And on the back seat was an eleven-year-old girl – who’s still missing. Soon the jacker begins communicating with the police: ‘IT’S STARTED NOW,’ he tells them. 'AND IT AIN’T GOING TO STOP JUST SUDDEN.’ And Caffery knows that he’s going to do it again. Soon the jacker will choose another car with another child on the back seat. Caffery’s a good and instinctive cop, but this time he knows something’s badly wrong. Because the jacker seems to be ahead of the police – every step of the way...

About this title

About the Author

Mo Hayder's debut, Birdman, was an international bestseller. Her second novel, The Treatment, also a Sunday Times bestseller, won the 2002 WH Smith Thumping Good Read award. Her third novel, Sunday Times bestseller Tokyo, won the Elle magazine crime fiction prize, and the SNCF Prix Polar. She has also written the bestselling Pig Island, as well as three books in the Walking Man series: Ritual, Skin and Gone.

READER BIO
Steven is one of a select group of readers who have narrated over 400 Audiobooks. Superlatives are many in reviews of his work, for which he is a multi-Earphones Award winner and twice nominated Audie finalist. He graduated from the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art in London and has established an acting career on both sides of the Atlantic in Theatre, Television, Film and Radio Drama performing with distinguished companies in New York and London. He is a member of the internationally acclaimed company Complicite.

Review

Praise for Mo Hayder

The very best thing a writer can do is to thoroughly and completely immerse the reader in a strange new world. Mo Hayder does it to perfection” Michael Connelly

"Mo has a profound ability to shock and surprise her readers She's the bravest writer I know" Karin Slaughter, author of Broken

I stand in awe of Mo Hayder's incomparable gifts as a storyteller.” Tess Gerritsen, author of the Rizzoli & Isles thrillers

The elaborate shock effects that define Hayder’s savage style ultimately serve their purpose in a novel that taps into the current fascination with all things supernatural and questions our assumptions about a number of subjects, from faith healing to cultish religious groups and society’s definition of evil.” Marilyn Stasio, The New York Times Book Review

Hayder shows herself to be a maestro of the sinister.” New York Daily News

Praise for Gone

Artfully constructed .Chilling .Shocks are in store.” Marilyn Stasio, The New York Times Book Review

Riveting . . . Hayder keeps the tension high. . . . The meticulously crafted plot is heightened by Hayder’s skillful evocation of mood as she summons the specter of a highly intelligent criminal who is taking great satisfaction from every parent’s worst nightmare. A captivating thriller.” Booklist (starred review)

Hayder writes some of the most carefully plotted, gripping and downright scary books in the mystery genre, and Gone continues that tradition in fine form.” Bruce Tierney, Bookpage

Mo Hayder’s gritty, intense thriller series featuring detectives Jack Caffery and Flea Marley is a must for anyone who likes breakneck timing and detectives who walk on the dark side.” Carol Schneck, The Daily News

A brilliantly plotted mystery that keeps you guessing not only who the villain is, but what exactly he's after . . . First-rate mystery that takes full advantage of the wintry, moonlit West Country and the unusual skills of its lady diver.” Kirkus Reviews

A carjacking goes from bad to horrifying in Hayder’s gripping fifth thriller .Hayder expertly brings to life the claustrophobia of Flea’s dives and the emotional burden of the case on Jack.” Publishers Weekly

With her latest, Gone, Mo Hayder takes you to the edge, then pushes you over in a heart-pounding rush of a story that will leave you battered and bruised, and wanting more.” Chevy Stevens, New York Times bestselling author of Still Missing

Gone, [Hayder’s] latest novel published in America, is one of those books that dares you to put it down once you’ve started reading and then challenges you to forget it once you have finished . The only way you can read Gone without having every nerve in your body jumping and screaming is if you are not paying attention. . Hayder is a storyteller par excellence [who] continues to drop charges into the water until practically the last paragraph. If you have read her previous works, you know what I’m talking about. If you’re new to her craftsmanship, read Gone and be enthralled. Strongly recommended.” Joe Hartlaub, Bookreporter.com

Twisty, fast-moving and often creepy While Hayder does a bang-up job larding her page-turning plot with blind alleys and unexpected curves, it is her in-depth character portrayals, especially of the mothers of the missing girls, that give the novel its depth and complexity.” Debra Ginsberg, Shelf Awareness (online)

The reader is kept rapt for more or less the first half of the book just by the mystery of the identity of the hijacker, and what he may have done to the child [shudder]. Then there is a sudden shift in intensity, as the plot takes unexpected and quite startling twists and turns, and from that point on I could not put the book down till its conclusion, breath held a good part of the way there.” Murder by Type (online)

I deduced that this was yet another suspense story about vanished children. If it's possible for a subject to be, at once, horrifying and humdrum, this is the one But when I started reading, I discovered that the thing I was most dreading - that hoary plot - turned out to be the novel's greatest pleasure It's a tribute to Hayder's powers as a suspense writer that she completely turns the over-familiar premise of this novel inside out and upside down. The more pages of Gone that we captivated readers turn, the farther away we get from cliched thriller conventions.” Maureen Corrigan, The Washington Post

Hayder keeps getting better This is an incredibly gripping story that makes one snatch any opportunity to read even a page or two and to stay up late to reach the satisfying conclusion.” Joe Strebel, Anderson’s Bookshop, Naperville, IL

Gone is a classic tension-filled thriller, elevated by Hayder’s characterization and her facility with description The final pages bring surprising revelations and the story ends with a shocking bang.” Leslie Doran, Mystery Science Magazine

Where she differs from her peers is her almost outlandish imagination. Hayder pushes the boundaries of what’s been said and written before Brilliantly perceptive portrayals of the victims and very clever, sympathetic plotting, not to mention an acute capturing of police procedure - Gone is Mo Hayder’s most compulsive thriller yet.” Daily Mirror (UK)

Anyone who enjoys intelligent, well-crafted plots and efficient, glowing writing will enjoy Mo Hayder. This is the fifth book in the Jack Caffery series and could well be the best. Mo Hayder raises the bar high when it comes to crime fiction and she’s done it again with this clever, stomach-churning, fast-paced, top-notch thriller.”
Sunday Express (UK)

Hayder, again, proves expert at ratcheting up the tension.” Irish Independent

She jolted the often-sedate world of police-procedural fiction with an unabashed readiness to gaze at the Gorgon of human behaviour; and detail it while pulling no punches” The Independent (UK)

Mo Hayder’s speciality, from her bleak and brilliant debut Birdman on, has been a particularly potent blend of terror and horror to create a suspense that not only grips her readers by the scruff of the neck but takes a firm hold on their intestines, too.” The Times (UK)

Her latest thriller serves up a fast-paced storyline that will see you racing through the pages.” The Edinburgh Evening News

They call her the queen of hardcore in high heels.’ The beautiful and terrifying Mo Hayder, since The Devil of Nanking, has honed her sense of narrative and sculpted her obsession with evil .[In Gone,] she delivers a message unsettling to all: the whole world, yes, anyone can be prey.” Le Point Magazine (France)

Praise for SKIN:

[A] chilling thriller . . . Hayder captures the claustrophobia of Flea's dives in unsettling detail and continues to build on her two damaged heroes.” Publishers Weekly (starred review)

[A] high-octane thriller . . . Hayder's grasp of . . . forensic detail . . . rivals P.D. James'. . . . Hayder has created conscientious and valiant figures in Marley and Caffery, whose disturbing human failings have the paradoxical effect of making readers trust and root for them. Nice work once again from one of the most dependable pros in the murder business.” Kirkus Reviews

Hayder fans expect an adrenalin-pumping plot with a high gruesome quotient and complex characters that don't just flirt with evil, they sometimes embrace it. Skin doesn't disappoint.” Carole E. Barrowman, Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel

"Hayder is not a subdued writer. Her characters are almost as chilling as the horrors that they are investigating Macabre, yes, but also absorbing and hugely entertaining." The Times (UK)

About this edition

• Publisher: Bantam Press
• Publication date: 2010
• ISBN 10: 0593063813
• ISBN 13: 9780593063811
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 416