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No Time For Goodbye #1
No Time for Goodbye
The house was deathly quiet. That was the first sign that something was terribly wrong. Fourteen-year-old Cynthia Bigge woke that morning to find herself alone. Her family—mother, father, and brother—had vanished without a word, without a note, without a trace. Twenty-five years later, Cynthia is still looking for answers. Now she is about to learn the devastating truth.
From critically acclaimed author Linwood Barclay comes a new suspense thriller that strikes to the core of our most primal fear. What if you woke one day to find your entire life had changed? If everyone you loved had disappeared overnight without so much as a chance to ask why?
Cynthia and Terry Archer still live in Milford, Connecticut, not far from the old Bigge house on Hickory Street. With a solid marriage and a young daughter, the Archers seem on track for a successful future. But the questions raised by Cynthia’s past still haunt her, and her obsession to find the answers threatens to destroy everything they’ve worked for. For Cynthia, there can be no closure until she finds out why her family disappeared—and how they could have left her behind.
Terry thinks the segment on the popular TV crime-stopper program Deadline is a mistake. But his wife hopes that someone watching will have a lead to her missing family. Sure enough, it’s Cynthia who spots the strange car cruising the neighborhood, hears the untraceable phone calls, and discovers the ominous “gifts.” And as Cynthia’s nerves begin to unravel, no one’s innocence is guaranteed, not even her own. By the time the first body is found, it’s clear that her past is more of a mystery than she ever imagined—or may ever survive.
Someone has returned to this Connecticut town to finish what was started twenty-five years ago. And by the time Terry and Cynthia discover the killer’s shocking identity, it will be too late even for goodbye.
From the Hardcover edition.
From critically acclaimed author Linwood Barclay comes a new suspense thriller that strikes to the core of our most primal fear. What if you woke one day to find your entire life had changed? If everyone you loved had disappeared overnight without so much as a chance to ask why?
Cynthia and Terry Archer still live in Milford, Connecticut, not far from the old Bigge house on Hickory Street. With a solid marriage and a young daughter, the Archers seem on track for a successful future. But the questions raised by Cynthia’s past still haunt her, and her obsession to find the answers threatens to destroy everything they’ve worked for. For Cynthia, there can be no closure until she finds out why her family disappeared—and how they could have left her behind.
Terry thinks the segment on the popular TV crime-stopper program Deadline is a mistake. But his wife hopes that someone watching will have a lead to her missing family. Sure enough, it’s Cynthia who spots the strange car cruising the neighborhood, hears the untraceable phone calls, and discovers the ominous “gifts.” And as Cynthia’s nerves begin to unravel, no one’s innocence is guaranteed, not even her own. By the time the first body is found, it’s clear that her past is more of a mystery than she ever imagined—or may ever survive.
Someone has returned to this Connecticut town to finish what was started twenty-five years ago. And by the time Terry and Cynthia discover the killer’s shocking identity, it will be too late even for goodbye.
From the Hardcover edition.
480 pages, Mass Market Paperback
First published September 25, 2007
1474 people are currently reading
21572 people want to read
About the author
Linwood Barclay
83 books7,198 followersLinwood Barclay is the #1 internationally bestselling author of seventeen novels for adults, including No Time for Goodbye, Trust Your Eyes and, most recently, A Noise Downstairs. He has also written two novels for children and screenplays.
Three of those seventeen novels comprise the epic Promise Falls trilogy: Broken Promise, Far From True, and The Twenty-Three. His two novels for children – Chase and Escape – star a computer-enhanced dog named Chipper who’s on the run from the evil organization that turned him into a super-pup.
Barclay’s 2011 thriller, The Accident, has been turned into the six-part television series L’Accident in France, and he adapted his novel Never Saw it Coming for the movie, directed by Gail Harvey and starring Eric Roberts and Emily Hampshire. Several of his other books either have been, or still are, in development for TV and film.
After spending his formative years helping run a cottage resort and trailer park after his father died when he was 16, Barclay got his first newspaper job at the Peterborough Examiner, a small Ontario daily. In 1981, he joined the Toronto Star, Canada’s largest circulation newspaper.
He held such positions as assistant city editor, chief copy editor, news editor, and Life section editor, before becoming the paper’s humour columnist in 1993. He was one of the paper’s most popular columnists before retiring from the position in 2008 to work exclusively on books.
In 2004, he launched his mystery series about an anxiety-ridden, know-it-all, pain-in-the-butt father by the name of Zack Walker. Bad Move, the first book, was followed by three more Zack Walker thrillers: Bad Guys, Lone Wolf, and Stone Rain. (The last two were published in the UK under the titles Bad Luck and Bad News.)
His first standalone thriller, No Time for Goodbye, was published in 2007 to critical acclaim and great international success. The following year, it was a Richard and Judy Summer Read selection in the UK, and did seven straight weeks at #1 on the UK bestseller list, and finished 2008 as the top selling novel of the year there. The book has since been sold around the world and been translated into nearly thirty languages.
Barclay was born in the United States but moved to Canada just before turning four years old when his father, a commercial artist whose illustrations of cars appeared in Life, Look and Saturday Evening Post (before photography took over), accepted a position with an advertising agency north of the border. Barclay, who graduated with an English literature degree from Trent University, in Peterborough, Ontario, was fortunate to have some very fine mentors; in particular, the celebrated Canadian author Margaret Laurence, whom Linwood first met when she served as writer-in-residence at Trent, and Kenneth Millar, who, under the name Ross Macdonald, wrote the acclaimed series of mystery novels featuring detective Lew Archer. It was at Trent that he met Neetha, the woman who would become his wife. They have two grown children, Spencer and Paige.
Three of those seventeen novels comprise the epic Promise Falls trilogy: Broken Promise, Far From True, and The Twenty-Three. His two novels for children – Chase and Escape – star a computer-enhanced dog named Chipper who’s on the run from the evil organization that turned him into a super-pup.
Barclay’s 2011 thriller, The Accident, has been turned into the six-part television series L’Accident in France, and he adapted his novel Never Saw it Coming for the movie, directed by Gail Harvey and starring Eric Roberts and Emily Hampshire. Several of his other books either have been, or still are, in development for TV and film.
After spending his formative years helping run a cottage resort and trailer park after his father died when he was 16, Barclay got his first newspaper job at the Peterborough Examiner, a small Ontario daily. In 1981, he joined the Toronto Star, Canada’s largest circulation newspaper.
He held such positions as assistant city editor, chief copy editor, news editor, and Life section editor, before becoming the paper’s humour columnist in 1993. He was one of the paper’s most popular columnists before retiring from the position in 2008 to work exclusively on books.
In 2004, he launched his mystery series about an anxiety-ridden, know-it-all, pain-in-the-butt father by the name of Zack Walker. Bad Move, the first book, was followed by three more Zack Walker thrillers: Bad Guys, Lone Wolf, and Stone Rain. (The last two were published in the UK under the titles Bad Luck and Bad News.)
His first standalone thriller, No Time for Goodbye, was published in 2007 to critical acclaim and great international success. The following year, it was a Richard and Judy Summer Read selection in the UK, and did seven straight weeks at #1 on the UK bestseller list, and finished 2008 as the top selling novel of the year there. The book has since been sold around the world and been translated into nearly thirty languages.
Barclay was born in the United States but moved to Canada just before turning four years old when his father, a commercial artist whose illustrations of cars appeared in Life, Look and Saturday Evening Post (before photography took over), accepted a position with an advertising agency north of the border. Barclay, who graduated with an English literature degree from Trent University, in Peterborough, Ontario, was fortunate to have some very fine mentors; in particular, the celebrated Canadian author Margaret Laurence, whom Linwood first met when she served as writer-in-residence at Trent, and Kenneth Millar, who, under the name Ross Macdonald, wrote the acclaimed series of mystery novels featuring detective Lew Archer. It was at Trent that he met Neetha, the woman who would become his wife. They have two grown children, Spencer and Paige.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 3,331 reviews
April 30, 2017
Holy crap on a cracker! This book was fantastic. Definitely a 5 star novel. I love Linwood Barclay because his writing is so similar to Harlan Coben's and I am a huge fan of Coben and am becoming an even bigger fan of Barclay.
This book gave me goosebumps more than once and in my book (no pun intended) that makes it a 4 or 5 star. Cynthia Bigge, a fourteen year old girl is drug home one night by her father after he catches her drinking and making out with a much older boy. When she gets home she has a spat with her father and wishes them all dead. The next morning she wakes to an empty house. No mom, no dad, and no brother.
Fast forward 25 years, Cynthia Bigge... now Cynthia Archer is married and has a daughter of her own. She still struggles with the disappearance of her family. No one ever found out what happened to them. Are they dead? Are they being held hostage by someone? Are they alive and living another life in another state? Cynthia struggles daily with her life as she tries to cope with her background. After her family disappeared she had to live with her Aunt Tess.
Now a strange car starts showing up, Cynthia believes she has seen her brother, and notes appear in the house... who is doing this and is her family really still alive? Her husband, Terry is torn between wanting to believe his wife and struggling with the fact that she might be losing it. The stress has taken over, he's sure and he is afraid that she might be imagining the things that are happening.
Terry, Cynthia, and Grace, their eight year old spunky daughter go on one hell of an adventure to figure out what happened 25 years ago and how it is affecting them all today. Twists and turns, daring rescues and hair-raising events will keep the reader intrigued throughout the whole story. I found myself having a hard time putting it down from time to time and there were even nights I went without sleep so I could see what happened.
I would highly recommend this thriller. Barclay never lets me down and once again he has followed through with a novel that has blown me away!
Ok: Actors for the movie if I were to have a movie..
Cynthia: Emma Stone (she has red hair and I could so see her in this role)
Terry: Hugh Jackman
Rolly: John Goodman
Aunt Tess: Sally Field
Enid: Melanie Griffith
Vince: Dolph Lundgren
Jane: Ellen Page
This book gave me goosebumps more than once and in my book (no pun intended) that makes it a 4 or 5 star. Cynthia Bigge, a fourteen year old girl is drug home one night by her father after he catches her drinking and making out with a much older boy. When she gets home she has a spat with her father and wishes them all dead. The next morning she wakes to an empty house. No mom, no dad, and no brother.
Fast forward 25 years, Cynthia Bigge... now Cynthia Archer is married and has a daughter of her own. She still struggles with the disappearance of her family. No one ever found out what happened to them. Are they dead? Are they being held hostage by someone? Are they alive and living another life in another state? Cynthia struggles daily with her life as she tries to cope with her background. After her family disappeared she had to live with her Aunt Tess.
Now a strange car starts showing up, Cynthia believes she has seen her brother, and notes appear in the house... who is doing this and is her family really still alive? Her husband, Terry is torn between wanting to believe his wife and struggling with the fact that she might be losing it. The stress has taken over, he's sure and he is afraid that she might be imagining the things that are happening.
Terry, Cynthia, and Grace, their eight year old spunky daughter go on one hell of an adventure to figure out what happened 25 years ago and how it is affecting them all today. Twists and turns, daring rescues and hair-raising events will keep the reader intrigued throughout the whole story. I found myself having a hard time putting it down from time to time and there were even nights I went without sleep so I could see what happened.
I would highly recommend this thriller. Barclay never lets me down and once again he has followed through with a novel that has blown me away!
Ok: Actors for the movie if I were to have a movie..
Cynthia: Emma Stone (she has red hair and I could so see her in this role)
Terry: Hugh Jackman
Rolly: John Goodman
Aunt Tess: Sally Field
Enid: Melanie Griffith
Vince: Dolph Lundgren
Jane: Ellen Page
August 4, 2008
I gave this book five stars simply for entertainment value. It was almost like watching a film, the characters came to life and the whole book was great fun to read - who cares if the plot was a little implausable.
It's not the sort of book you'll want to keep and read again but enjoy it as a fast food treat. If you read it over a weekend as I did, beware, you might not get much else done.
It's not the sort of book you'll want to keep and read again but enjoy it as a fast food treat. If you read it over a weekend as I did, beware, you might not get much else done.
January 2, 2020
It is a mystery to me why I have not read more of this author's books. I picked this one up for a Challenge (Canadian author) and it was really good.
The premise was excellent. Teenage girl wakes up one morning and finds her mother, father and brother have all gone. There last night, gone this morning, and twenty or more years later there is still no sign of what happened to them. A mystery indeed.
As incidents occurred to bring back the past I tried to guess where the clues were leading and who was responsible. I got bits right and other parts totally wrong but it was all good exercise for the brain. it all got very tense at times and the ending was very satisfactory.
Recommended for anyone who likes a smart thriller and, oh look, there is a follow up book as well!
The premise was excellent. Teenage girl wakes up one morning and finds her mother, father and brother have all gone. There last night, gone this morning, and twenty or more years later there is still no sign of what happened to them. A mystery indeed.
As incidents occurred to bring back the past I tried to guess where the clues were leading and who was responsible. I got bits right and other parts totally wrong but it was all good exercise for the brain. it all got very tense at times and the ending was very satisfactory.
Recommended for anyone who likes a smart thriller and, oh look, there is a follow up book as well!
June 12, 2023
No Time for Goodbye begins when 14-year-old, Cynthia, wakes up after a night of partying with her boyfriend, feeling hungover and worried about the trouble she is going to be in with her parents after her dad found her extremely intoxicated and with a much too old boy the previous evening. However, when she goes searching for parents and then her brother, they are nowhere to be found.
Flash forward 25-years.... Cynthia has still never found out what happened to her family and has carried the scars of not knowing with her into her adulthood. Now married, she and her devoted husband, Terry Archer, have a lovely young daughter named Grace and a seemingly perfect household. Sadly, Cynthia cannot move on from the childhood trauma she suffered and her ceaseless quest for answers about what happened to her family all those years ago has caused much strain on the whole family.
Terry is determined to find answers for his heartbroken wife and starts his own investigation after Cynthia leaves with Grace following an evening of arguing. The countless twists and turns take Terry all over the map as he is led to one piece of the puzzle after another, until, finally, they all come together, to form the whole picture perfect puzzle.
Mr. Barclay has written a phenomenal storyline filled with a supremely well-developed, dynamic, and authentic cast of characters.
Narrator Christopher Lane masterfully utilizes Barclay's heart-stopping pace, escalating to an edge-of-your-seat climax and seamlessly depicting every character - family, coworkers, murderers, a hilarious "wise-guy", and his even goofier minions, etcetera... A top-notch audio performance. Bravo.
Flash forward 25-years.... Cynthia has still never found out what happened to her family and has carried the scars of not knowing with her into her adulthood. Now married, she and her devoted husband, Terry Archer, have a lovely young daughter named Grace and a seemingly perfect household. Sadly, Cynthia cannot move on from the childhood trauma she suffered and her ceaseless quest for answers about what happened to her family all those years ago has caused much strain on the whole family.
Terry is determined to find answers for his heartbroken wife and starts his own investigation after Cynthia leaves with Grace following an evening of arguing. The countless twists and turns take Terry all over the map as he is led to one piece of the puzzle after another, until, finally, they all come together, to form the whole picture perfect puzzle.
Mr. Barclay has written a phenomenal storyline filled with a supremely well-developed, dynamic, and authentic cast of characters.
Narrator Christopher Lane masterfully utilizes Barclay's heart-stopping pace, escalating to an edge-of-your-seat climax and seamlessly depicting every character - family, coworkers, murderers, a hilarious "wise-guy", and his even goofier minions, etcetera... A top-notch audio performance. Bravo.
June 16, 2019
Linwood Barclay has written another thriller that will keep you turning the pages the characters are strong & the plot well penned.
WHAT WOULD YOU DO if YOU WOKE UP ONE MORNING TO FIND YOUR PARENTS & BROTHER JUST DISAPPEARED WITHOUT A TRACE!!
When Cynthia Bigge wakes up on a Saturday morning to find her Mother Patricia & father Clayton & brother Todd gone she panics after a wild night with boyfriend Vince Fleming she wonders what the hell is going on?
Years later now married to Terry Archer & Daughter Grace 8 they return to the house to see if they can find out what happened 14 years earlier, Claire who is now seeing a therapist wants to find out the truth once & for all.
She gets letters from someone unknown telling her that she should leave things be but she is headstrong & hires Denton Abagnall to see what he can find out, he tells her he will see what he can do, suddenly she rings his cell to find out if he has found anything out but has disappeared his wife hadn't heard from him either?
so as she goes further to find out what has happened she brings in a detective to help her with her search, soon they discover that Denton Abagail has been murdered as well as Cynthia's Aunt BUT WHAT IS THEIR MOTIVE!!
As the investigation deepens they go to find Vince h er former boyfriend who has a chequered past he helps but gets shot in the process.
Cynthia hires a Psychic Keysha Ceylon from a TV show she is desperate for information but she turns out to be a charlatan a fake what happens is the biggest catfight you could see .
What happens later in the book is just to unbelievable for me to say any more lets just say Clayton is found & remarried to Enid who is one bitter old lady who has her own agenda I didn't like her at all.
I found the ending to be a total surprise wasn't expecting it at all.
IF YOU HAVE NOT READ LINWOOD BARCLAY YET WHY THE HELL NOT !! he is a class author who will have you spell bound.
WHAT WOULD YOU DO if YOU WOKE UP ONE MORNING TO FIND YOUR PARENTS & BROTHER JUST DISAPPEARED WITHOUT A TRACE!!
When Cynthia Bigge wakes up on a Saturday morning to find her Mother Patricia & father Clayton & brother Todd gone she panics after a wild night with boyfriend Vince Fleming she wonders what the hell is going on?
Years later now married to Terry Archer & Daughter Grace 8 they return to the house to see if they can find out what happened 14 years earlier, Claire who is now seeing a therapist wants to find out the truth once & for all.
She gets letters from someone unknown telling her that she should leave things be but she is headstrong & hires Denton Abagnall to see what he can find out, he tells her he will see what he can do, suddenly she rings his cell to find out if he has found anything out but has disappeared his wife hadn't heard from him either?
so as she goes further to find out what has happened she brings in a detective to help her with her search, soon they discover that Denton Abagail has been murdered as well as Cynthia's Aunt BUT WHAT IS THEIR MOTIVE!!
As the investigation deepens they go to find Vince h er former boyfriend who has a chequered past he helps but gets shot in the process.
Cynthia hires a Psychic Keysha Ceylon from a TV show she is desperate for information but she turns out to be a charlatan a fake what happens is the biggest catfight you could see .
What happens later in the book is just to unbelievable for me to say any more lets just say Clayton is found & remarried to Enid who is one bitter old lady who has her own agenda I didn't like her at all.
I found the ending to be a total surprise wasn't expecting it at all.
IF YOU HAVE NOT READ LINWOOD BARCLAY YET WHY THE HELL NOT !! he is a class author who will have you spell bound.
March 29, 2016
"Well, I'll tell you something," he said, "but not if you're going to tell the cops because if you do, I'll tell them I never said any of this, because they might find a way to use it against me, the fuckers."
This book was just okay. It's a thriller. Cynthia's 14 when her mom, dad, and older brother disappear one night. Their cars are missing. Their beds aren't slept in. There's no trace of them.
Were they murdered? Kidnapped? Did they leave and abandon their daughter? It's three decades later and no one has any idea. But Cynthia is permanently scarred by what happened and she's living with the damage, which is affecting her marriage and her 8-year-old daughter, who is overprotected by Cynthia.
But now strange things are happening. Cynthia is getting strange e-mails, letters, and calls. An old hat of her father's shows up on the kitchen table one day. And people are getting murdered...
...
This book had a solid, interesting story - but Linwood Barclay is no Jeff Abbott, in my opinion. For a thriller, you could do a lot worse than this. The mystery is fast-paced, exciting, mysterious, and makes relative sense.
However, I didn't feel very connected to the characters or their stories. Barclay could have done a better job on making me care for his MCs.
The book is narrated by Terry - Cynthia's husband. I thought I liked him for a long time, but eventually he started grating on me with his distrust of his own wife and his occasional stupidity.
...
Tl;dr - Not a bad book, or a bad thriller. I just think Jeff Abbott's work is better. Or Zoë Sharp's The Blood Whisperer. They specialize in this kind of fast-paced thriller novel. Eric Plume and Robert B. Parker might also be good choices if you want a more "hard-boiled P.I." flavor.
Overall, an okay book. I don't have any real complaints, but I'm not gushing about it, either.
This book was just okay. It's a thriller. Cynthia's 14 when her mom, dad, and older brother disappear one night. Their cars are missing. Their beds aren't slept in. There's no trace of them.
Were they murdered? Kidnapped? Did they leave and abandon their daughter? It's three decades later and no one has any idea. But Cynthia is permanently scarred by what happened and she's living with the damage, which is affecting her marriage and her 8-year-old daughter, who is overprotected by Cynthia.
But now strange things are happening. Cynthia is getting strange e-mails, letters, and calls. An old hat of her father's shows up on the kitchen table one day. And people are getting murdered...
...
This book had a solid, interesting story - but Linwood Barclay is no Jeff Abbott, in my opinion. For a thriller, you could do a lot worse than this. The mystery is fast-paced, exciting, mysterious, and makes relative sense.
However, I didn't feel very connected to the characters or their stories. Barclay could have done a better job on making me care for his MCs.
The book is narrated by Terry - Cynthia's husband. I thought I liked him for a long time, but eventually he started grating on me with his distrust of his own wife and his occasional stupidity.
...
Tl;dr - Not a bad book, or a bad thriller. I just think Jeff Abbott's work is better. Or Zoë Sharp's The Blood Whisperer. They specialize in this kind of fast-paced thriller novel. Eric Plume and Robert B. Parker might also be good choices if you want a more "hard-boiled P.I." flavor.
Overall, an okay book. I don't have any real complaints, but I'm not gushing about it, either.
February 12, 2023
A good psychological thriller is all in the mind!
The first paragraph of the dust jacket blurb was a hook that would haul in any reader who enjoys a good thriller, "The house was deathly quiet. that was the first sign that something was terribly wrong. Fourteen year old Cynthia Bigge woke that morning to find herself alone. Her family - mother, father and brother - had vanished without a word." The actual story picks up some twenty-five years later as Cynthia deals with the questions raised by her past and attempts to find the solution to the mystery that has haunted her for most of her life.
The hallmark of a superb psychological thriller is that, for the most part, nothing actually happens. What drives a reader to relentlessly turn the pages is imagination, atmosphere, character, ideas ... all of those literary devices that we used to hate when our English teacher talked about them. NO TIME FOR GOODBYE qualifies in spades. It's a dark, deeply atmospheric thriller driven mostly by what happens in the mind of the reader as opposed to what Barclay actually decided to really commit to the written word.
You won't want to put this one one down. And, as the dénouement approaches and the action actually starts to happen, it's fast, it's frantic and it's compelling. I'm certain this will qualify as one of my best reads of the year. Highly recommended.
Paul Weiss
The first paragraph of the dust jacket blurb was a hook that would haul in any reader who enjoys a good thriller, "The house was deathly quiet. that was the first sign that something was terribly wrong. Fourteen year old Cynthia Bigge woke that morning to find herself alone. Her family - mother, father and brother - had vanished without a word." The actual story picks up some twenty-five years later as Cynthia deals with the questions raised by her past and attempts to find the solution to the mystery that has haunted her for most of her life.
The hallmark of a superb psychological thriller is that, for the most part, nothing actually happens. What drives a reader to relentlessly turn the pages is imagination, atmosphere, character, ideas ... all of those literary devices that we used to hate when our English teacher talked about them. NO TIME FOR GOODBYE qualifies in spades. It's a dark, deeply atmospheric thriller driven mostly by what happens in the mind of the reader as opposed to what Barclay actually decided to really commit to the written word.
You won't want to put this one one down. And, as the dénouement approaches and the action actually starts to happen, it's fast, it's frantic and it's compelling. I'm certain this will qualify as one of my best reads of the year. Highly recommended.
Paul Weiss
September 23, 2015
My first Lynwood Barclay novel, which I picked up on a whim at the library, as I had been hearing things about this author from my Aussie Reader friends. I was constantly checking and unchecking boxes, second guessing my ideas as to ‘who dunnit’. My assumptions were partly correct, and I enjoyed trying to work it out.
Cynthia finds herself abandoned by her family one day, she’s woken up one day and they’ve simply vanished. The story continues on the 25th anniversary of Cynthia’s disappearance, when she has a family of her own and is desperate to find out exactly what happened. Are they dead or alive? How could they have left her alone? Many red herrings later, and a lot of enjoyable characters were introduced along the way.
I liked this book, not loved, I can actually see this review is a little flat! Looks like I should review by books straight after reading, I don’t have a lot to say about this one. But in saying that, as I searched just now for this book to write up this review, I see there is a sequel. I will definitely read this. Sorry for the confusion, it looks like I liked it enough to find out more!
Cynthia finds herself abandoned by her family one day, she’s woken up one day and they’ve simply vanished. The story continues on the 25th anniversary of Cynthia’s disappearance, when she has a family of her own and is desperate to find out exactly what happened. Are they dead or alive? How could they have left her alone? Many red herrings later, and a lot of enjoyable characters were introduced along the way.
I liked this book, not loved, I can actually see this review is a little flat! Looks like I should review by books straight after reading, I don’t have a lot to say about this one. But in saying that, as I searched just now for this book to write up this review, I see there is a sequel. I will definitely read this. Sorry for the confusion, it looks like I liked it enough to find out more!
September 10, 2017
14 year-old girl wakes up to find her entire family gone, it had me at "hello".
March 19, 2009
I picked this one up because the description reminded me of Harlan Coben's books, but was disappointed. The first half of the book, in which Barclay set up his story, is more description than action. I found it pretty boring. No great writing here either. So many readers have commented on the mounting suspense in this book. I found none of that. I felt none of the shock or sense of dread that I usually get when I read a mystery/thriller. Two thirds into the book, I didn't care what actually happened to Cynthia's family. Forgettable and not recommended.
April 1, 2008
if you can stand the "F" word every other page, sometimes many times in one page...then read this book. Its a lot of fun and really interesting. If I cared enough tho, I'd write the author and tell him how a)unnecessary and b)annoying it was to have to see that word over and over again. I know to some people its not an issue at all but to me..blech. The book was so good on its own, it didn't need it AT ALL.
February 23, 2021
Intriga a raudales y buen ritmo de acción en este libro.
Se lee muy rápido porque necesitas saber qué ocurrió con los padres y el hermano de la protagonista, desaparecidos de repente cuando ella tenía 15 años.
Veinticinco años después, Cynthia decide acudir a un programa para hablar de su caso. Pronto se arrepentirá ya que algo amenaza su vida desde ese momento.
No es un libro espectacular pero consigue mantener la tensión hasta el final y engancharte a sus páginas rápidamente. Recomiendo si la intriga es lo tuyo.
Se lee muy rápido porque necesitas saber qué ocurrió con los padres y el hermano de la protagonista, desaparecidos de repente cuando ella tenía 15 años.
Veinticinco años después, Cynthia decide acudir a un programa para hablar de su caso. Pronto se arrepentirá ya que algo amenaza su vida desde ese momento.
No es un libro espectacular pero consigue mantener la tensión hasta el final y engancharte a sus páginas rápidamente. Recomiendo si la intriga es lo tuyo.
August 14, 2021
Una familia desaparece una noche dejando atrás, inexplicablemente, a su miembro más joven: Cynthia una adolescente de 15 años. Pasan los años y Cinthia ha formado su propia familia, pero el comprensible deseo de descubrir la verdad la obsesiona...y al lector también.
Un libro imponente, vertiginoso, difícil de abandonar sin conocer la resolución, donde las cartas están lealmente expuestas y, pequeño detalle, hay que saber encajarlas. Así se hace.
Un libro imponente, vertiginoso, difícil de abandonar sin conocer la resolución, donde las cartas están lealmente expuestas y, pequeño detalle, hay que saber encajarlas. Así se hace.
June 10, 2025
Линууд Баркли е написал добър крими трилър - изчетох го с интерес.
Някои моменти не ме удовлетвориха, а и развръзката ми дойде по-напудрена от очакванията ми.
Моята оценка - 3,5*.
Първа среща с автора, но ако ми попадне друга негова книга, ще я пробвам непременно.
P.S. Има продължение, което не е преведено на български.
Някои моменти не ме удовлетвориха, а и развръзката ми дойде по-напудрена от очакванията ми.
Моята оценка - 3,5*.
Първа среща с автора, но ако ми попадне друга негова книга, ще я пробвам непременно.
P.S. Има продължение, което не е преведено на български.
November 30, 2024
This was a fun read. Trying to figure out what was going to happen next...and mostly failing. Did guess one characters fate, though.
Imagine waking up one morning after getting paralytic the night before and there's no-one home. No mother (Patricia), no father (Clayton) and no older brother (Todd). It's as if they vanished into thin air. Poof!
Well, that's what happens to 14 yr old Cynthia Bigge (Cyn) after a night of partying with her dodgy boyfriend, Vince Fleming.
We start off with Cynthia's perspective, then it quickly switches to her husbands (Terrance Archer) POV twenty-five years later - which I thought was quite intriguing. So we're stuck inside his head for the rest of the story, as they're still looking for answers, as to what happened to her family that night in 1983. Are they still alive? Are they dead? Did they just abandon her? Punishment for getting drunk?
Interestingly, further into the story he hooks-up with an unlikely ally, lol.
In summation: really enjoyed this one. The secrets, lies, betrayals and the reveals are making my head spin right around. Looking forward to reading "No Safe House" which I think is book 2 with some of the same characters. I think.
Imagine waking up one morning after getting paralytic the night before and there's no-one home. No mother (Patricia), no father (Clayton) and no older brother (Todd). It's as if they vanished into thin air. Poof!
Well, that's what happens to 14 yr old Cynthia Bigge (Cyn) after a night of partying with her dodgy boyfriend, Vince Fleming.
We start off with Cynthia's perspective, then it quickly switches to her husbands (Terrance Archer) POV twenty-five years later - which I thought was quite intriguing. So we're stuck inside his head for the rest of the story, as they're still looking for answers, as to what happened to her family that night in 1983. Are they still alive? Are they dead? Did they just abandon her? Punishment for getting drunk?
Interestingly, further into the story he hooks-up with an unlikely ally, lol.
In summation: really enjoyed this one. The secrets, lies, betrayals and the reveals are making my head spin right around. Looking forward to reading "No Safe House" which I think is book 2 with some of the same characters. I think.
November 8, 2023
This book made my head spin, it's a real page turner.
I will read the sequel.
Five stars.
I will read the sequel.
Five stars.
November 2, 2011
I only recently discovered this author's books when I read THE ACCIDENT. since I loved that, I then read TOO CLOSE TO HOME and loved it too. I then started reading this clunker and was surprised to find that Barclay had written such a dud.
The book begins with look back 25 years into the past when then 14 year old wild child Cynthia wakes up the morning after she had been found making out and drinking in a car with an older boy by her dad Clayton. Once home, she runs upstairs yelling back to dad Clayton and mom Patricia that she hates them and wishes they were dead. She is surprised to find her parents' and even her older brother Todd's beds made up, no one home, no note saying where her mom has gone ( Mom always leaves one.) and no breakfast fixings. At school, the guy she was caught with asks where Todd is. Cynthia had presumed he had been driven to school by their mom and that their mom went shopping afterwards and that her dad is off to one of his trips (he travels a lot in his work.) but now she realizes something is wrong. She rushes home and her neighbor calls the police. One cop suspects she had done something to the family.
Fast forward 25 years and Cynthia is married to high school English teacher Terry and is the mom of 8 year old Grace. They live a short distance from the home everyone disappeared from (she had gone to live with her mother's sister Aunt Tess after that happened)and she works part time in the dress shop of her old friend from high school Pamela.
The crime-stopper program DEADLINE is filming a segment of what happened to her 25 years ago in hopes of breaking the cold case and finding out what happened. Unfortunately it does not bring in any calls but it does disturb something from the past.
What don't I like about this book by an author I do enjoy reading? Here are a few reasons:
(1) I did not like or even empathize with any of the characters. I love children but 8-year-old Grace does nothing but whine about the fact that her mother walks her to school instead of letting her walk alone. She is a pip. It is constant through the book and terribly annoying. I didn't like the young or the grown up Cynthia who has a personality that alternates from a nutcase to a zombie. Who would date this woman, marry her, want to father kids with her? Well, obviously Terry who is so boring who would want him anyway? Mr. Perfect has his hands full with these two females. It is never good when you kind of what somebody bad to get hold of the whole lot of them and shake them up some.
(2) For a high school English teacher, Terry is woefully lacking in grammar, usage, and language skills. Wouldn't he know that it should be "Grace and I went to the store." rather than "Me and Grace went to the store."? He also uses, and has Grace saying, "fox pass" for "faux pas". I would think that a teacher would want to speak properly in front of his own kids and teach her to do the same. In class also, he both uses profanity and allows his students to write it in their assignments which schools do not allow.
(3) The back story of Cynthia's dad defies belief. It turns out that when he was young, he had been tricked into marriage by a truly evil woman named Enid who had pretended to be pregnant. She then faked a miscarriage (the doctor told him there was no pregnancy nor miscarriage). He stayed with her though he had grounds (in those days you needed grounds) for an annulment because of fraud but he stayed and they had a son Jeremy. Enid was obsessed with the child, kept Clayton from having a relationship with him, and turned him against his dad.
Unhappy Clayton met Patricia on a business trip, fell in love, and married her (yes, still married to Enid). The problem here is that he got fake ID but we are to believe that the marriage license bureau for the state would not check the ID with the driver's license office (they DO check). We are also to believe that while he lived in New York with Enid and Jeremy, he also maintained a household in Connecticut with Patricia and their 2 kids Todd and Cynthia using fake ID. In 26 years he never got stopped by cops on the road. Though the last names were different- how did he pay taxes? How did he get insurance in two names? There are many little practical things the author did not think through.
(4) What happened on the day Cynthia's family disappeared is also a flight of fancy. Enid has found a phone bill from the home Clayton shared with Patricia and their kids.She checked things out and found out he was a bigamist and saw Patricia and Todd (but not Cynthia). Todd looks just like Clayton and also Enid's own son Jeremy. We are to believe that this forty-something woman followed Patricia and Todd to the store in broad daylight and cut their throats with no struggle and no one seeing her do it, called Clayton to come help her dispose of the bodies, then forced him to come with her, never travel anymore, and never follow up on Cynthia. Honestly! If I had gotten a call like that, I would have gone where she was with the bodies, police in tow!! Surely no guy is that stupid!
(5) The school principal Rolly is near retirement age and we find that he, Terry's boss, has also killed several people which of course Terry uncovers and is almost killed by him too.
(6) Clayton's will leaves everything to Cynthia. Enid somehow felt suspicious (why?) and gets the lawyer's secretary to show it to her. She and Jeremy then set out to kill Cynthia and Grace and then Clayton and Terry as well.
You would think all of this would be very exciting but frankly I couldn't care less about any of the characters and was distracted by the little details and lack of reality too much to buy it as real. Not recommended.
The book begins with look back 25 years into the past when then 14 year old wild child Cynthia wakes up the morning after she had been found making out and drinking in a car with an older boy by her dad Clayton. Once home, she runs upstairs yelling back to dad Clayton and mom Patricia that she hates them and wishes they were dead. She is surprised to find her parents' and even her older brother Todd's beds made up, no one home, no note saying where her mom has gone ( Mom always leaves one.) and no breakfast fixings. At school, the guy she was caught with asks where Todd is. Cynthia had presumed he had been driven to school by their mom and that their mom went shopping afterwards and that her dad is off to one of his trips (he travels a lot in his work.) but now she realizes something is wrong. She rushes home and her neighbor calls the police. One cop suspects she had done something to the family.
Fast forward 25 years and Cynthia is married to high school English teacher Terry and is the mom of 8 year old Grace. They live a short distance from the home everyone disappeared from (she had gone to live with her mother's sister Aunt Tess after that happened)and she works part time in the dress shop of her old friend from high school Pamela.
The crime-stopper program DEADLINE is filming a segment of what happened to her 25 years ago in hopes of breaking the cold case and finding out what happened. Unfortunately it does not bring in any calls but it does disturb something from the past.
What don't I like about this book by an author I do enjoy reading? Here are a few reasons:
(1) I did not like or even empathize with any of the characters. I love children but 8-year-old Grace does nothing but whine about the fact that her mother walks her to school instead of letting her walk alone. She is a pip. It is constant through the book and terribly annoying. I didn't like the young or the grown up Cynthia who has a personality that alternates from a nutcase to a zombie. Who would date this woman, marry her, want to father kids with her? Well, obviously Terry who is so boring who would want him anyway? Mr. Perfect has his hands full with these two females. It is never good when you kind of what somebody bad to get hold of the whole lot of them and shake them up some.
(2) For a high school English teacher, Terry is woefully lacking in grammar, usage, and language skills. Wouldn't he know that it should be "Grace and I went to the store." rather than "Me and Grace went to the store."? He also uses, and has Grace saying, "fox pass" for "faux pas". I would think that a teacher would want to speak properly in front of his own kids and teach her to do the same. In class also, he both uses profanity and allows his students to write it in their assignments which schools do not allow.
(3) The back story of Cynthia's dad defies belief. It turns out that when he was young, he had been tricked into marriage by a truly evil woman named Enid who had pretended to be pregnant. She then faked a miscarriage (the doctor told him there was no pregnancy nor miscarriage). He stayed with her though he had grounds (in those days you needed grounds) for an annulment because of fraud but he stayed and they had a son Jeremy. Enid was obsessed with the child, kept Clayton from having a relationship with him, and turned him against his dad.
Unhappy Clayton met Patricia on a business trip, fell in love, and married her (yes, still married to Enid). The problem here is that he got fake ID but we are to believe that the marriage license bureau for the state would not check the ID with the driver's license office (they DO check). We are also to believe that while he lived in New York with Enid and Jeremy, he also maintained a household in Connecticut with Patricia and their 2 kids Todd and Cynthia using fake ID. In 26 years he never got stopped by cops on the road. Though the last names were different- how did he pay taxes? How did he get insurance in two names? There are many little practical things the author did not think through.
(4) What happened on the day Cynthia's family disappeared is also a flight of fancy. Enid has found a phone bill from the home Clayton shared with Patricia and their kids.She checked things out and found out he was a bigamist and saw Patricia and Todd (but not Cynthia). Todd looks just like Clayton and also Enid's own son Jeremy. We are to believe that this forty-something woman followed Patricia and Todd to the store in broad daylight and cut their throats with no struggle and no one seeing her do it, called Clayton to come help her dispose of the bodies, then forced him to come with her, never travel anymore, and never follow up on Cynthia. Honestly! If I had gotten a call like that, I would have gone where she was with the bodies, police in tow!! Surely no guy is that stupid!
(5) The school principal Rolly is near retirement age and we find that he, Terry's boss, has also killed several people which of course Terry uncovers and is almost killed by him too.
(6) Clayton's will leaves everything to Cynthia. Enid somehow felt suspicious (why?) and gets the lawyer's secretary to show it to her. She and Jeremy then set out to kill Cynthia and Grace and then Clayton and Terry as well.
You would think all of this would be very exciting but frankly I couldn't care less about any of the characters and was distracted by the little details and lack of reality too much to buy it as real. Not recommended.
December 1, 2012
So fourteen year old Cynthia has a huge fight with her dad and goes to bed, the next morning she wakes up to find her father, mother and brother have vanished, no note, no nothing. The cars are gone and so are they.
Move forward years and Cynthia is married with an 8 year old and still has no idea what happened to her family. All of a sudden things start happening and
Told from the perspective of Cynthia's husband so you never know if Cynthia is involved, if she's nuts. It was a really great mystery, very well told. Basically 3/4's of the way through I was still totally in the dark about what was going on and decided the only conclusion I would be upset with was "Alien Abduction"
Spoiler Alert: It was not alien abduction
Totally recommend not procedural crime at all, good old fashioned mystery.
Move forward years and Cynthia is married with an 8 year old and still has no idea what happened to her family. All of a sudden things start happening and
Told from the perspective of Cynthia's husband so you never know if Cynthia is involved, if she's nuts. It was a really great mystery, very well told. Basically 3/4's of the way through I was still totally in the dark about what was going on and decided the only conclusion I would be upset with was "Alien Abduction"
Spoiler Alert: It was not alien abduction
Totally recommend not procedural crime at all, good old fashioned mystery.
October 9, 2007
I thoroughly enjoyed this book - it was written from the point of view of the woman's husband, and he takes you through the past, what little they know...starting with the 25th anniversary of her family's disappearance. About 1/3rd of the way through, you start to get pieces of the puzzle, but they throw in a lot of speculation about who could have done it. Parts of it kept me guessing right until the very end. LOVED this book!
July 25, 2011
I'll admit I don't normally read this type of thriller, but a colleague of mine lent this to me and I was hooked. I flew through the book in about a day and a half (one of the benefits of calling in sick). Definitely enough twists to keep you guessing and make you wonder just what was going to happen at the end. I'll have to check out another one of Barclay's books now.
December 1, 2012
An excellent novel from one of my favourite writers.
He writes such good original stories that have strong characters and believable plots.
He writes such good original stories that have strong characters and believable plots.
October 26, 2021
No Time For Goodbye opens with teenaged and hung-over Cynthia Bigge waking up to an empty home. Her family - father, mother and brother - having disappeared without so much as a note. Fast forward 25 years, Cynthia is now married with a daughter of her own and the story takes off from there. Well, actually it creeps along from there - never a good thing for a "thriller" - one of the major problems with this book.
No Time For Goodbye is reminiscent of books by Chris Mooney and Harlan Coben, i.e. taking an "ordinary" person and putting them in very extraordinary circumstances. Terry Archer - Cynthia's husband - narrates the tale of the ups and downs of living with his wife who is still haunted by her family's disappearance. Cynthia believes her family is still alive and "out there", and thus possibly having abandoned her, she doesn't have closure. After appearing on a pseudo Cold Cases TV show strange things begin to pop up which suggest that Cynthia may be correct.
To give credit where credit is due the central hook or plot twist which drives this story is fairly ingenious, unfortunately the narrative around it is doled out piecemeal and at times excruciatingly slow, drip by drip as if from an eye-dropper. I also found Terry and Cynthia unrealistic - for instance Cynthia, an understandably over-protective mother, abandons her daughter without a second thought in the middle of a crowded shopping mall to chase a man who looks like her long lost brother. When Terry follows her lead, she blows up at him for leaving their daughter alone in the Food Court. The book is full of such incongruities concerning our protagonists. Because of this I found it difficult to work up any empathy for these two and at times found them downright aggravating.
The supporting cast of relatives, friends, co-workers and even a therapist, pop in and out of the story and are one-dimensional, supplying the requisite sympathy or asking the obvious questions. All the law enforcement characters are brusque, unsympathetic and incompetent.
The anti-climactic conclusion, much like the book, drags on for much too long. Although entertaining at times I found No Time For Goodbye a sub-par thriller.
A quick note on the book’s “language", something I usually don't notice let alone get offended by. Many of the characters, especially Cynthia and Terry, swear like young teenagers out of the house and testing their foul mouth chops for the first time. Tedious, grating and another minus while reading this book.
No Time For Goodbye is reminiscent of books by Chris Mooney and Harlan Coben, i.e. taking an "ordinary" person and putting them in very extraordinary circumstances. Terry Archer - Cynthia's husband - narrates the tale of the ups and downs of living with his wife who is still haunted by her family's disappearance. Cynthia believes her family is still alive and "out there", and thus possibly having abandoned her, she doesn't have closure. After appearing on a pseudo Cold Cases TV show strange things begin to pop up which suggest that Cynthia may be correct.
To give credit where credit is due the central hook or plot twist which drives this story is fairly ingenious, unfortunately the narrative around it is doled out piecemeal and at times excruciatingly slow, drip by drip as if from an eye-dropper. I also found Terry and Cynthia unrealistic - for instance Cynthia, an understandably over-protective mother, abandons her daughter without a second thought in the middle of a crowded shopping mall to chase a man who looks like her long lost brother. When Terry follows her lead, she blows up at him for leaving their daughter alone in the Food Court. The book is full of such incongruities concerning our protagonists. Because of this I found it difficult to work up any empathy for these two and at times found them downright aggravating.
The supporting cast of relatives, friends, co-workers and even a therapist, pop in and out of the story and are one-dimensional, supplying the requisite sympathy or asking the obvious questions. All the law enforcement characters are brusque, unsympathetic and incompetent.
The anti-climactic conclusion, much like the book, drags on for much too long. Although entertaining at times I found No Time For Goodbye a sub-par thriller.
A quick note on the book’s “language", something I usually don't notice let alone get offended by. Many of the characters, especially Cynthia and Terry, swear like young teenagers out of the house and testing their foul mouth chops for the first time. Tedious, grating and another minus while reading this book.
February 22, 2011
Looking for a thriller that you don't want to put down? Then you need to read No Time for Goodbye by Linwood Barclay. [return][return]This book is definitely a page turner! Cynthia's paranoia - is it in her head? Something she's doing - maybe a split personality? What happened to her family? Are they really dead? I cannot imagine for even a second that my family would just disappear. It's not even in my ability to imagine. Knowing that, I can imagine how if that were to happen, how messed up I would be. How I really would have trust issues. And abandonment issues. And, really, all sorts of issues! (And, yes, I know I already have issues --- these are not what I am referring to!) [return][return]The book is written primarily from Terry's, Cynthia's husband, point of view. And it's easy to see he wants to believe her and yet also easy to believe that maybe she's finally cracking up after 25 years. The characters are quite real, flawed, and I could imagine all of them in my town. I felt myself rooting for Cynthia not to be crazy, but boy howdy! I probably would have had her committed! LOL [return][return]I read this book all today. It was a perfect day for reading and the perfect book as I didn't want to put it down. I highly recommend this thriller.
September 17, 2020
Mr Barclay certainly knows how to keep you glued to the pages, especially in the final chapters. Even though I figured out a lot of this plot early on, I still enjoyed it. You need to suspend belief while reading this book, totally implausible actions!
It was another one of those 25 year later happenings coming to light in the present - it was never explained why it took so many years to look further into this cold case.
Terry was a namby-pamby husband, who would put up with this moody, depressed wife for all those years? Poor Grace. I was glad the rest of the cast got the ending they deserved.
It was another one of those 25 year later happenings coming to light in the present - it was never explained why it took so many years to look further into this cold case.
Terry was a namby-pamby husband, who would put up with this moody, depressed wife for all those years? Poor Grace. I was glad the rest of the cast got the ending they deserved.
March 23, 2018
My second Barclay book. This one is slow-moving and detail oriented. I stayed with it even though I didn't like it as much as A Tap on the Window It is difficult to write much without giving a spoiler. However, there is one character that I thought was unbelievable--didn't seem real. I began to figure out the solution, but didn't get it all; so it was good until the very end.
March 12, 2018
Very disappointing. It started off well intended with novel ideas. But when you have absolutely no substance to the characters who gives a f*ck? And then to lose all integrity to the mystery by copping out to the most predictable of outcomes, really?! It's like eating a spoiled peanut. You wanted and expected it to be good but once you bit into it SOUR!
March 1, 2009
Very unexpected, at times very humorous, this book offered something essential: the need to keep reading until I knew what had happened. The characters, especially the daughter, were very well-defined and I cared about what happened to them
September 4, 2009
Grabbed this book on a whim as I was dashing out the door to the airport. It ended up being an entertaining read for the plane ride to Panama. After a night of teen drinking, Cynthia Archer wakes to find her family missing. This plot has been explored in many ways by different authors. Barclay's take on what happened to the family is not extraoridnary but neither is it boring. I was able to figure out who did what before the end of the book but that was not a bad thing. What made the read for me was much of it took place in my own state of Connecticut. I hadn't realised this would be the locale when grabbing the book. Barclay has a series featuring science-fiction author Zack Walker. No Time for Goodbye is a stand-alone thriller. I'm going to try another by this retired Toronto Star Humor Columnist. Passed the book on to a fellow traveler and saw her engrossed in the pages on our canal journey. She seemed to be enjoying the sun, the water and the book!
February 18, 2022
Nos encontramos ante una novela de suspense que quizá no gane el premio a libro del año (aunque ya sabemos que muchos premios se los dan a 📚 💩) , pero que cumple su cometido como artículo de entretenimiento con creces.
Sus 400 páginas (creo que le sobran unas cuantas) me han durado menos de dos días; me ha tenido enganchada totalmente e intrigada por saber qué, cómo y porqué.
Me ha resultado una lectura muy ligera, con muchos diálogos y descripciones de escena, como si fuera un guión televisivo. Probablemente este libro haya sido carne de telefilm de sobremesa de Antena 3; cumple las premisas para ello: tragedia familiar, tensión y acción muy a la americana.
¿Recomendaría este libro? Sí, sin duda alguna. Adictivo, original, ligero y con todo bien resuelto
Sus 400 páginas (creo que le sobran unas cuantas) me han durado menos de dos días; me ha tenido enganchada totalmente e intrigada por saber qué, cómo y porqué.
Me ha resultado una lectura muy ligera, con muchos diálogos y descripciones de escena, como si fuera un guión televisivo. Probablemente este libro haya sido carne de telefilm de sobremesa de Antena 3; cumple las premisas para ello: tragedia familiar, tensión y acción muy a la americana.
¿Recomendaría este libro? Sí, sin duda alguna. Adictivo, original, ligero y con todo bien resuelto
January 16, 2015
I liked this one a lot. The best part is that I can read the next one No Safe House right away.
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