The Missing Hours
3.5/5
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Currently unavailable
Currently unavailable
About this ebook
One moment, Selena Cole is at the playground with her children . . . the next, she has vanished without a trace.
The body of Dominic Newell, a well-respected lawyer, is found on a remote mountain road, blood oozing from the stab wound in his neck.
In the sleepy borderland between England and Wales, serious crimes are rare. Which makes this Tuesday morning, with two calls coming in to the local police station, even more remarkable. Detective Constable Leah Mackay and her brother, Detective Sergeant Finn Hale, soon find their respective investigations inextricably linked. And when Selena reappears alive and unhurt twenty hours later, the mystery deepens.
Selena’s work consulting on kidnap and ransom cases has brought her into close contact with ruthless criminals and international drug lords. But now, as Selena walks back into her life, blood-spattered, claiming no memory of the preceding hours, Leah can’t be sure if she is a victim, a liar, or a suspect.
Leah and Finn delve into each case, untangling the secrets and betrayals—large and small—that can lie just beneath the surface of a life, yet unprepared for where each trail will lead . . .
“We predict big things for Emma Kavanagh . . . addictive.”
—Good Housekeeping
“A born storyteller with room to grow.”
—Publishers Weekly
Emma Kavanagh
Emma Kavanagh was born and raised in South Wales. After graduating with a PhD in Psychology from Cardiff University, she spent many years working as a police and military psychologist, training firearms officers, command staff and military personnel throughout the UK and Europe. She started her business as a psychology consultant, specializing in human performance in extreme situations. She lives in South Wales with her husband and young son.
Read more from Emma Kavanagh
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Reviews for The Missing Hours
19 ratings6 reviews
- Rating: 2 out of 5 stars2/5I expected a tense, suspenseful story, but what I got instead was more of a drama-filled police procedural. It all had a bit of a soap opera feel, actually. The opening scene is written from seven-year-old Heather's perspective, as she realizes her mother is missing. This short scene sets up what feels like a powerful story to come. Heather doesn't have another narrating part in the story, at least not that I remember. Most of the narration alternates between the brother and sister cops, both written in first person. I didn't much like either character. Leah is wrapped up in personal drama. She may or may not still love her husband, and she feels inadequate as a mother. We spend a lot of time in her head as she wallows in these issues, but we don't see much interaction with her husband and I don't think there were any scenes with her children. Finn, Leah's brother, is newly promoted. He also feels inadequate, though his worries are with his job performance. He pretends to have it all together but constantly worries that he can't take the pressure. Honestly, these two characters were largely interchangeable. Toward the end of the book, a few other characters are given short narrating parts, all in third person. Interspersed through the entire book we also have short pieces that are either excerpts from published articles or documents from Selena's business files. Eventually we find that most of these pertain in some way to the outcome of the story. All of this, for me, gave the story a jumbled feel. I thought the shared documents slowed the pace and felt impersonal. The plot begins with two cases that initially seem unrelated, though Leah's intuition tells her otherwise. I found Selena's situation intriguing, and I was mostly invested in learning more about that case. Her character was the only thing that kept me reading. I could easily have done without all the pity party nonsense from the two cops. In the end, the twists didn't surprise me, perhaps because everything unfolded so slowly, with many hints along the way. For me, the story would have been far more compelling had Selena's narration been more of a focus, with less wallowing in adequacy from the cops. As a side note, I received an advance copy from the publisher via Amazon Vine. I didn't realize that this is a re-release with a different publisher. That made no difference in my review. I'm just pointing it out for readers who might notice reviews for this book from a couple of years ago. I don't know if there are any changes, significant or otherwise, in this second release.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5This is the story of Selena Cole, who goes missing, leaving her two young children in the play park near their home. The book is mainly written in the first person, narrated by a number of characters - the police detectives leading the case, Selena herself, Orla and Seth who work with Selena and even Fae, the solicitor's administrator/secretary. However the story also includes a number of case files from the 'kidnap and ransom' business that Selena used to run with her husband. The mystery of Selena's disappearance and return is gradually unpicked, alongside the seemingly unconnected murder of a local solicitor. Reading this book is a bit like immersing yourself in a very good 'whodunnit' but I was wrong with every guess. The quote on the cover says 'finding her was only the beginning' and that sums up the book exactly! As a reader, you are thrown into the story very quickly. There are twists and turns and lots of characters and details, but it is not difficult to keep up. Even the case files, which seem initially to be only there to give insight to Selena's previous work, turn out to have a much greater relevance in the end. I loved it and will definitely read other books by this author.Thank you to Netgalley for providing the review copy of this novel.
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5I wanted to enjoy this book more than i did to be honest i enjoy a crime read, i had heard about it via twitter and it had some great reviews... I found it a bit hard going to be honest all the K&R stories distracted me and made me lose the thread of what was going on i also had to really concentrate on which ds or di was telling the story.I liked the book but i have read much better.
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5An unlikely story of a woman's disappearance then appearance.Not sure I followed it too well.I'll re read later and see if I can make more sense of it.I was given a digital copy of this book by the publisher Random House via Netgalley in return for an honest unbiased review.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Selena Cole disappears, leaving her seven and three year old children alone in a park. She is found the next day, but claims to have no memory of what happened to her. The police are too busy to pursue this any further as a local solicitor is found dead beside a remote road. Gradually it becomes clear that the two cases are linked.Selena and her deceased husband set up a company dealing with kidnap and rescue demands, operating in countries like Columbia, and the narrative is interspersed with (very interesting) case studies describing their work and rescue negotiations. The other narrative strands are told mostly from the viewpoints of Finn (the DS) and his sister Leah (a DC) and their voices are confusingly indistinguishable from one another, unless Leah is taking a moment to muse on her twin daughters or agonize about her marriage. Generally, this was an enjoyable read, although it could perhaps have been a little pacier. I found Finn and Leah's diffidence about their competence wearing; I do prefer to read about people who are confident/good at their job. The idea that the police would let Selena's reappearance bring an end to that investigation, in a sort of "all's well that ends well" way, struck me as extremely unlikely; two small children were left/abandoned in a park - at the very least surely social services would have been involved. What is to say it wouldn't happen again?The "big reveal" was something I had worked out for myself - I'm not sure how, maybe the author planted well-placed clues. SPOILER I wondered why it did not occur to Leah to find out who collected the remaining 40,000 GBP from the bank.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5This is a mystery/thriller and a police procedural rolled into one. I really enjoyed this book and could not wait to find out how this all linked together.
Dr. Selena Cole disappears from a playground one day while watching her two children. DC Leah McKay is called in to check it out. Before she is able to solve the mystery, Selena is found wandering on the river bank with now memories of where she had been or what she had done. In a parallel investigation, Leah's brother DI Finn Hale is investigating the death of a local solicitor.
I was a bit confused at the beginning of this book trying to figure out how all this fit together. There were also case files from the business that Selena and her husband Ed Cole started. It was a company that negotiated kidnap for ransom releases as well as teach companies how to protect themselves. The number one suspect in the death of the solicitor was a previous employee and friend of Ed Cole. Ed died in a bombing in Brazil the previous year and his brother-in-law, who now runs the company fired Beck. Leah can not let go of the suspicion that the disappearance of Dr. Cole and the death of the solicitor are linked.
This was a twisting and turning plot with different chapters being told from various perspectives of the characters in the book. A great read.
Thanks to Netgalley and Cornerstone Digital for the opportunity to read and review this book. This is my unbiased review.