A Child Is Missing

by David Stout

A newspaper editor in upstate New York is drawn into a deadly web of hatred and suspicion when he joins the hunt for a kidnapped little boy in this gritty and evocative thriller from an Edgar Award–winning author

Long Creek in New York’s Hill County is an angry place—depressed, suspicious, and unforgiving. In the aftermath of a late-November snowstorm, one of the town’s youngest citizens, five-year-old Jamie Brokow, the son of wealthy divorced parents, is abducted. His family pays the kidnappers their ransom, but the boy is never returned—and soon afterward, Fran Spicer, the local reporter covering the case, dies as the result of a mysterious car crash that the police are all too eager to attribute to alcohol.
 
Will Schafer edits a newspaper in a neighboring county, and he’s less willing to dismiss the death of his friend Spicer so easily. Schafer won’t find much local support for his investigation, however—strangers like him are not welcome in Long Creek. Still, he is determined to uncover the truth and see that justice is served, for Fran and for little Jamie. But the hunt could have powerful, unanticipated consequences for everyone involved: Schafer, the townspeople, the police, the devastated family . . . and an odd, disfigured hermit, drawn from his solitude in the forest by the frightened cries of a small child in the night.

226 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 2014

About the author

David Stout (b. 1942) is an accomplished reporter who has been writing mysteries and true crime since the 1980s. Born in Erie, Pennsylvania, Stout took a job at the New York Times in 1982. He spent nearly twenty-eight years at the newspaper, as a reporter, editor and rewrite man covering national news and sports, and retired in 2009.

Stout began writing his first novel while working at the Times. Based on the true story of a 1940s double-murder for which fourteen year-old George Stinney was controversially executed, Carolina Skeletons (1988) won Stout an Edgar award for best first novel. After two more well-received mysteries, Night Of The Ice Storm (1991) and The Dog Hermit (1993), Stout turned to writing non-fiction. Night Of The Devil (2003) tells the story of famous convict Thomas Trantino, while The Boy In The Box (2008) is an investigation of one of America’s most famous unsolved murders. Since retiring from the Times, Stout has redoubled his work on his next book.

Reviews

[Diane · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved this story and read it in two days; couldn’t put it down. Suspense all the way through, well written, easy to follow.