Now this is a good, absorbing read. Two eighteen year old British girls go missing during their gap year in Thailand. Kate Waters, the journalist sent to cover the story, gets a nasty shock when her son, who’s also in Thailand, becomes a suspect in the girls’ disappearance.
This clever novel taps into a parent’s worse nightmare from multiple perspectives. How do you live through the frantic worry of not hearing from your children when they are in a foreign place and untraceable? Where do you go for help? And when it becomes clear, as it does for Kate, that your child is simply choosing not to contact you, how do you deal with that? How do you refute the suspicions of others when you have no clear idea what your child is up to? And if you discover your child is leading a far more dangerous and seedy life than you could ever have imagined and still has not asked for your help, how do you cope with that knowledge?
Barton goes deeper into her characters with this work than with her previous thrillers –The Widow, The Child- both of which only felt skin deep. The visceral horror of the girls’ parents at their fate, and their subsequent falling apart, feel entirely credible. Barton’s understanding of the frantic pace of media work, the media’s collusion with the police and its often complicated relationship with the families close to a crime no doubt comes from experience – she has a long and distinguished career in journalism. The tawdriness of backpacker life in Bangkok and the disinterest of the Thai police also feel authentic. Presenting the story from multiple perspectives works beautifully to move the action along. I especially love the bold writing at the beginning of each chapter that reminds the reader who each character is: ‘The Detective’,‘The Reporter’. So handy for an forgetful old bag like me who usually has to write these things down….
The Suspect is essentially a perfect companion from a long plane ride or a good sit down on a rainy day. It won’t change your life but it will keep you reading. And maybe yearning to install tracking devices on your children, but that’s a seperate issue….
