Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #328921 in Books
• Published on: 2006-10-03
• Original language: English
• Binding: Hardcover
• 384 pages

From Publishers Weekly
At the start of Edgar-winner Burke's well-crafted 10th novel of suspense (after 2005's Bloodlines), sociopathic killer Cleo Smith has just murdered a graphic artist, Richard Fletcher, who was a member of a large, bizarre California family, but Smith's motive for the killing remains obscure. Five years later, Fletcher's adopted son has been wrongfully convicted of the crime, and Burke's resourceful and compassionate reporter heroine, Irene Kelly, has written a story about missing children that has prompted a host of inquiries from desperate relatives who have lost their own children. When more bodies turn up and further clues point to involvement of Fletcher family members, Kelly, aided by her police detective husband, Frank Harriman, puts her life on the line to exonerate the innocent prisoner and uncover the disturbing secrets at the heart of the Fletcher clan. The many plot twists should keep readers turning the pages, even if the windup is a little improbable. (Oct.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From Booklist
Family dysfunction takes on new meaning in Edgar winner Burke's latest mystery featuring newspaper reporter Irene Kelly (after Bloodlines, 2004). Like the earlier installments, this one is set in the fictional Southern California town of Las Piernas. Multimillionaire Graydon Fletcher and his wife have devoted their lives to providing for the less fortunate. Unable to have children themselves, the couple opts to adopt--21 boys and girls in all. Though they are not bound by blood, there's something incestuous about the Fletcher clan; nearly all of the offspring attend the elite Fletcher Academy (founded and funded by Graydon), and even as they grow older, the siblings spend nearly every waking hour in one another's company. After one Fletcher son is murdered and another is imprisoned for the crime, Kelly and her homicide-detective husband, Frank Harriman, unearth sinister truths about stolen identities and stolen lives. Burke's writing is crisp, but her characters are predictable, and her plot convoluted at best. Readers fascinated by forensic science should be content to focus on the pivotal clues gathered through the wonders of DNA. Allison Block
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

About the Author
National bestseller Jan Burke is the author of eleven novels and a collection of short stories. Among the awards her work has garnered are Mystery Writers of America's Edgar® for Best Novel, Malice Domestic's Agatha Award, Mystery Readers International's Macavity, and the RT Book Club's Best Contemporary Mystery. She is the founder of the Crime Lab Project (www.crimelabproject.com) and is a member of the board of the California Forensic Science Institute. She lives in Southern California with her husband and two dogs. Learn more about her at www.janburke.com.

Customer Reviews

PLOT TWISTS AND DASHES OF FORENSIC SCIENCE


Life's short and there are so many good books that if a story doesn't grab me by the first chapter, it's just put aside. Edgar Award winning author Burke didn't need a chapter - just two pages - actually opening lines:

"Cleo Smith firmly believed that neatness counted, especially if you were going to get away with murder. Which was why she now stood completely naked, save for a pair of plastic booties and a pair of thin rubber gloves, in the office of the man she had just killed."

With "Kidnapped," her tenth suspense novel, Jan Burke has outdone herself. After the murder and any telltale traces of evidence have been removed, the story flashes back to the fictional California town of Las Piernas and the Fletchers, outstanding citizens all. They're a large family, powerful, led by patriarch Graydon Fletcher after whom an exclusive private school has been named. He seems to be a model citizen, so concerned for the care of the young that he and his wife have adopted 21 children in all.

However, every family has one they call a black sheep and, in the Fletcher's case, it would be Richard, an artist. He doesn't buy into the pattern drawn for the whole family and refuses to let his children tow the patriarchal line. Death comes too soon to him - he's found murdered in his studio. His three-year-old daughter, Jenny is missing as is his stepson, Mason. It only takes hours for the police to locate Mason as he has trashed his car in the San Bernardino mountains. With the murder weapon found in his car, Mason is convicted of killing his stepfather, Richard, and little Jenny.

Only Caleb, his older brother believes he is innocent. Five years later Caleb is working in forensic science, and has been sent to study recently found remains - a puzzler as the deceased is supposedly hiding somewhere with the son he kidnapped several years ago. At about this same time reporter Irene Kelly has written an article about the number of child snatchings by relatives in Las Piernas, and she is sent to the site where Caleb is working.

As it happens there is also new evidence about Jenny's disappearance. Someone will stop at nothing to make sure that Kelly and Caleb never discover the truth.

Those who enjoy their mysteries with plot twists and dashes of forensic science will sit up all night turning the pages of "Kidnapped."

- Gail Cooke