No Time for Goodbye by Linwood Barclay
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Book Reviews of No Time for Goodbye
Book Review: Watch out Coben.
Summary: 4 Stars
No Time for Goodbye starts out in the past were a young teenage girl wakes up one day to find that her entire family has mysteriously vanished, leaving no traces as to were they could have gone. Flashforward 25 years later after the horrific event, Cynthia is now happily married, has a daughter, good job, everything she could ask for. However creepy things start to happen to the family, break-ins, people watching the house at night, cars stalking the daughter, you name it. As the family bebins to investigate these strange outings, they soon start to dig up the past which in the end is too much to bear.
I havent read a good book for a while, so this being my first Barlcay book, I didnt have very high expectations, however it seemed like Harlan Coben - one of my favorite authors - could have wrote it based off the description so I thought Id give it a try. Turns out the book was pretty good. The characters were believeable and likable, the pacing was good, even the prose was spot on to make this a fast enjoyable read. Anytime I finished a chapter, I didnt want to stop because it was gripping and entertaining. However, there were two things that irked me about this book.
1. The main characters wife Cynthia.
This may seem a little contradictory to what I said earlier, but Cynthia was the only unlikable character in this book. She was constantly annoying, acted like an idiot and seemed constantly hyperactive throughout the book. The best part was when she decided to take the daughter away and go hide for the rest of the book untill the end. I understand that shes paranoid about things happening to her daughter because of what happened to her, but being her personal walking assistant to and from school every day? Thats too much, which even the dad(main character) and daughter agree with. She shows how her intelligence is lacking when the family comes across a dead body laying in the middle of the kitchen in a pool of blood with a knife sticking out of its back. Her initial reaction? "She must have had a concussion!" Really? A concussion? I didnt think it was possible for someone to be that stupid, but this scene proved me wrong and I couldnt help but sigh, facepalm, and turn the page.
2. The ending was terrible.
Like I said earlier, the book had a nice pace to it: giving us hints as to what happened years ago and throwing a bit of suspence and action here and there. When you finally come to around the last ten chapters of the book, a whole slew of information and plot twists explode in your face and youll find yourself scratching your head asking "What the hell just happened?" To say that it jumps the shark here would be an understatement. The main plot twist towards the end is so laughable because it throws out any ideas you might of gotten as to who the murderers were or what happened to Cynthias family because its so rediculous that you will never expect it to happen.
In the end, this book was good, but the two problems listed above almost ruined it for me. If you can ignore how annoying Cynthia is, the book is definately worth checking out as it was probably the best book Ive read this summer, if not this year.
Book Review: One of the best thrillers I have read!
Summary: 4 Stars
I don't read thrillers that much. Mainly this is because most of them seem to provide just senseless excitement and lack actual plotline. No Time for goodbye not only raises the bar for thrillers, its also an intelligently written book. Its not just about momentary adrenaline rush, its very well-written too. The robotic quality that so many thrillers have is lacking here, its very human.
The novel is gripping and intriguing. It proceeds at breakneck speed. When I had started reading it, I had not slept properly for 2 days. But once I started on it, I didn't need caffeine to stay awake. The plot served as caffeine for me! No Time for Goodbye deals with the most terrifying thing that can happen to any human. "What If .." - we are so scared of these two words. Linwood Barclay has delved deep into one of the most common fears of the human psyche. What if one day everyone whom you love just disappears, like they had never existed? What if you are left all alone , with so many questions unanswered? The "not knowing" is worse than the "knowing" itself. "What if.."...scary, huh?
Fourteen years old, Cynthia, causes her parents much trouble staying out late at night, disobeying and fighting. One night, there's a huge fight after Cynthia's father discovers her in a car with her boyfriend who is another troublemaker. Cynthia storms into her bedroom, shuts the door and drifts off to sleep. Next morning when she comes downstairs, there is noone there. She tries to convince herself that there must be some other rational explanation but the realization dawns soon...her father, mother and brother have gone without a trace.... 25 years later, their disappearance is still a mystery and it haunts Cynthia's every waking hour. Married with an 8 year old daughter, she is an overprotective mother, a worrier. She still yearns to know what happened to her family. As a last resort, she decides to appear on a reality show called Deadline in a desperate attempt to find her family.
What follows is complete chaos, as shocking truths are discovered which turn Cynthia's world upside down. I felt that Cynthia's trauma, the effect of her family's disappearance has been well-described. We feel for her and sympathize with her. Its stuff of nightmares - all our loved ones vanishing and leaving us behind.... No Time for goodbye was exciting, engrossing and edge-of-the-seat. But it was also an emotional ride. Somewhere while reading the novel, we all will say to ourselves- "what if something similar happens to me?" The very prospect is frightening!
The character development was great too. The author did not compromise with the characters just to add to the action. The readers will genuinely care about the characters. We feel what they are feeling - grief, love, loss, fear and so on. We become involved with the characters. As the novel twists and turns , it sucks you right in and you are hooked until the last page.
Overall:
Intense suspense and brilliant writing.
Recommended?
Yes! Especially if you are bored with thrillers that just provide momentary adrenaline rush.
Book Review: Resolving a 25 year old mystery
Summary: 4 Stars
Cynthia Bigge is a 14 year old who went on a date with a high school senior who is connected to crime, gets roaring drunk, and when confronted by her father, she has a huge argument with her parents and stomps off to bed to sleep off the drunkeness. When she wakes up, her whole family is gone.
Twenty five years later, Cynthia is married and is raising her own daughter when she starts getting clues about her family. Having undergone such a traumatic experience when she was young has poisoned her outlook and she seems unstable. These clues from the past threaten to destabilize her further. Her husband tells us the story from his perspective and it is easy to see how the various clues and hints that appear out of seemingly nowhere are creating a sense of desperation with Cynthia.
Of course the Archers get the police involved and when they do not do much, the Archers get a private detective involved. The detective ends up getting killed as does Cynthia's only remaining family member - her aunt Tess. This gets the husband mobilized and he starts looking for clues as to what is going on.
While all this is going on, the author threw in an interesting literary device. At the end of every chapter there is a section in which two other people are talking. It is not clear immediately who they might be, but as the story progresses, it is clear that these are people who are involved in the story line. After a little bit, one gets the impression that these people are probably Cynthia's long lost mother and brother, but you are never quite sure till the end who they really are.
The story evolves at a rapid pace and there are some good action sequences as well as an increasing sense of foreboding that builds over Cynthia and her daughter Grace. This mystery thriller positively haunted you as one more layer of information was provided and then another until you reach the explosive ending. It was a great, fun, read, and only the last few chapters made me take one star away. That was because of the parallel plot and twist that were introduced that involve a character that appears in the book as a friend, but ends up being something compeletely different. I felt that this tenuous plot device was unnecessary and detracted from the story line.
I highly recommend this book and enjoyed the very final plot twist - which was a tearjerker!
Book Review: Slow moving thriller focuses on characters instead of twists and turns.
Summary: 4 Stars
Linwood Barclay's thriller NO TIME FOR GOODBYE receives exceptional praise from well known authors on the back cover. Tess Gerritsen, Joseph Finder, and Peter Robinsion all say this book is a suspensful page turner full of twists and turns and that it has a stunning conclusion. One author even compares Barclay's book to those of Harlan Coben. This is very high praise, and some of it is merited and some isn't.
The plot is certainly like one of Coben's. Cynthia Bigge wakes up one morning and finds her entire family missing. Her parents and older brother have just vanished. No note, no message, no trace. Fast forward twenty five years later, and Cynthia is married to Terry Archer. They have a daughter. Cynthia never has heard anything about her family. She's become desperate enough to try one of those TV news magazines that recreates the incident and asks viewers for help.
The Archer's don't have much money, he's a school teacher and she works at her friends dress shop. But they do what they can and hire a private detective. Soon, things begin to happen. Cynthia notices a strange car following her daughter to work. Her father's old hat shows up on her dining room table. She thinks she sees her brother at the mall.
The plot is very intriguing, and the novel really picks up about halfway through, but overall, it moves kind of slow. There aren't really many twists and turns. The plot just moves slowly in the direction of revealling the truth. Instead of twists filling up the pages, Barclay focuses on character development. We really know the Archers and their pain.
I thought the conclusion was revealed too early in the novel, but then the book does spiral to a thrilling ending. The explanation for all that happened is certainly plausible, but the villian's abilities were someone exaggerated. Anyway, this is a good book, but a little slower moving than I expected. I give it four stars, but it is really between 3 and 4.
Book Review: captivating, interesting, and logical
Summary: 4 Stars
A fourteen-year old girl misbehaves. She dates a seventeen year-old boy, a son of a known criminal, against the will of her parents. She lies to her parents, hiding the fact that she dates him. Her secret is revealed. Her father goes out to find her late at night. He grabs her from her boyfriend's car, bringing her home. She is fast asleep, drunk, pissed and tired.
The following morning she wakes up. The usual morning sounds - kitchen, dishes, shower - are absent. The house is quiet. Very quiet. She goes downstairs to the kitchen. No one is there. The kitchen is clean, as if no one ate breakfast yet. She goes to her parents' bedroom. It is empty. She goes to her brother's room. Nobody is in the house. She looks for a note, explaining this emptiness. There is no note.
She goes to school, thinking that by the time she returns home, her family will be back. She does not know what to think. In the afternoon, she returns to an empty home. Now she is really worried. She goes to her neighbor, who saw or heard nothing. They call the police. An investigation starts.
Twenty-five years later, the girl who grew up to be a married woman and a mother, receives a voice from the past. She and her husband embark on a mission to discover what had happened on that tragic night.
The first 100 pages of this book are somewhat difficult to follow. But as you advance with the reading, the book does not let you go. It is captivating, interesting, and logical, despite the seemingly illogical happenings that unfold. An entertaining read for the last days of the summer.