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Missing and Exploited
A car collector looking for a place to store his vintage Studebakers stumbles across a name carved in a wooden beam from a century-old building. Just a quarter mile away, the skeletal remains of a young woman are found outside a homeless camp. The investigation that Corrigan starts as a favor to his old friend quickly becomes a nightmare beyond anything he could have imagined. As the body count rises, the mystery spirals ever deeper until it takes on a life of its own. For decades, children have been vanishing without a trace until Corrigan uncovers the terrible truth. But nothing comes without a price. Relationships are torn apart, and at times, even nature works against Corrigan and his small team of investigators as they track down obscure clues from the cold case files. Chasing leads across five states over six months, Corrigan faces the greatest challenges of his investigative career.
396 pages, Hardcover
Published November 8, 2016
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April 5, 2017
A river runs through it, in fact more than one, as the mystery deepens and the plot twists and turns. This is the third in Ken Baysinger's mystery novels starring the private investigator, Corrigan, and others--including his assistant Martha and significant other Kim Stayton, who mysteriously runs away in this book.
There are other disappearances--cold cases of young girls kidnapped and sometimes held captive. The plot begins when Kim is a witness to the discovery of a young woman's remains in a homeless camp near the river. The mysteries: Why has this ominous discovery, and another related to an abduction, upset Kim and caused her to vanish from Corrigan's life and home in Canemah, near Oregon City, Oregon? Other cases involve cold-case abductions and the sudden appearance of a young woman, so far unidentified. Who was the young man whose remains are found near the previous discovery of bones? What follows are more leads, new discoveries, and some wild goose chases.
As the topic of this novel is disturbing--abductions and exploitation of girls--the author does an excellent job with grieving families' reactions to the events, findings, and Corrigan's probing questions. Corrigan himself is a feeling person whose emotions often show through. But the author has kept the emotional responses true to character and unsentimental.
There is much local color along with colorful characters in this book, as in the previous ones in the series, including Corrigan's lumbering yellow tomcat, DC. As Corrigan lives along the Willamette River, there is much riverine activity and even a natural disaster. Colorful characters Captain Alan and Bud, the beer-drinking buddy, play important roles in the story. Bud's character is further developed when he becomes involved with investigating some of Corrigan's leads.
Corrigan travels extensively to follow clues, mostly around Oregon. He leaves his home base near Willamette Falls to travel south down the Rogue River, east to Burns and Malheur County, and to Salem the state capital. Out of state trips include Alcatraz Prison and other destinations.
Details are good in grounding the reader. One especially good sequence chillingly describes a trip upriver in the dark of night, in a partly disabled tugboat, to rescue a friend pinned down by a landslide on the verge of drowning as the water rises in the rain-soaked tent entrapping him. But there are other details that could have been better edited. For instance, not every line of phone dialog is necessary, especially when the result is a dead end that doesn't move the story forward. And more editing is needed on travel details and minor steps of research that don't pan out. In at least one case, more pages are spent on targeting the wrong suspects than in chasing down the right ones. Of course, that's probably how real investigations work, but in a book the unnecessary details cause the reader to start skipping paragraphs.
One issue in the story was never concluded: the medical fraud case that Martha was mostly working on, in which Bud cooperated in a sting investigation. But all in all, this was a satisfying read (with skimming.)
There are other disappearances--cold cases of young girls kidnapped and sometimes held captive. The plot begins when Kim is a witness to the discovery of a young woman's remains in a homeless camp near the river. The mysteries: Why has this ominous discovery, and another related to an abduction, upset Kim and caused her to vanish from Corrigan's life and home in Canemah, near Oregon City, Oregon? Other cases involve cold-case abductions and the sudden appearance of a young woman, so far unidentified. Who was the young man whose remains are found near the previous discovery of bones? What follows are more leads, new discoveries, and some wild goose chases.
As the topic of this novel is disturbing--abductions and exploitation of girls--the author does an excellent job with grieving families' reactions to the events, findings, and Corrigan's probing questions. Corrigan himself is a feeling person whose emotions often show through. But the author has kept the emotional responses true to character and unsentimental.
There is much local color along with colorful characters in this book, as in the previous ones in the series, including Corrigan's lumbering yellow tomcat, DC. As Corrigan lives along the Willamette River, there is much riverine activity and even a natural disaster. Colorful characters Captain Alan and Bud, the beer-drinking buddy, play important roles in the story. Bud's character is further developed when he becomes involved with investigating some of Corrigan's leads.
Corrigan travels extensively to follow clues, mostly around Oregon. He leaves his home base near Willamette Falls to travel south down the Rogue River, east to Burns and Malheur County, and to Salem the state capital. Out of state trips include Alcatraz Prison and other destinations.
Details are good in grounding the reader. One especially good sequence chillingly describes a trip upriver in the dark of night, in a partly disabled tugboat, to rescue a friend pinned down by a landslide on the verge of drowning as the water rises in the rain-soaked tent entrapping him. But there are other details that could have been better edited. For instance, not every line of phone dialog is necessary, especially when the result is a dead end that doesn't move the story forward. And more editing is needed on travel details and minor steps of research that don't pan out. In at least one case, more pages are spent on targeting the wrong suspects than in chasing down the right ones. Of course, that's probably how real investigations work, but in a book the unnecessary details cause the reader to start skipping paragraphs.
One issue in the story was never concluded: the medical fraud case that Martha was mostly working on, in which Bud cooperated in a sting investigation. But all in all, this was a satisfying read (with skimming.)
Displaying 1 of 1 review