Prominent Maine artist Zetta Nadeau approaches Detective Charlie Parker to look into the sudden disappearance of her boyfriend, Wyatt Riggins.  Upon digging, Parker discovers that the missing man in question is involved in the kidnapping of four children belonging to the ruthless Mexican cartel boss, Blas Urrea.  Desperate to see the safe return of his “property” Urrea dispatches two of his best agents.  Can Charlie track down and locate Riggins or is he risking a collision with two cold-blooded killers?

John Connolly returns with the twenty-second installment of his acclaimed crime fiction series featuring his titular detective.  Once again, the mystery at the center of the novel is rock solid and the suspense it generated had me on the edge of my seat.  The pair of villains Connolly puts up against Parker are deeply sinister, one more so than the other.  Her actions  chilled me to the core and she quickly became one of Connolly’s more shocking creations.  Much like one of my other favorite writers, Lawrence Block, Connolly decided to age his main character alongside himself, so there are signs here that time is beginning to catch up with Parker.  While he’s just as dogged and determined as ever, there are moments where his body isn’t quite as willing as his mind, which makes his job a bit harder to do, especially when up against younger foes.  Thankfully Parker has lots of help in the shape of formidable allies who have his back.

Speaking of those allies, I’ve been reading this series for so long now that I feel at home with these characters; they basically feel like family at this point, and the banter between Charlie and his two friends Louis and Angel once again had me in stitches.  If John ever wanted to write a novel about the three of them sitting around a table and chatting for three hundred pages or so, I’d be first in line to buy it.

Connolly ends the story with an eye to the future where it feels like something big is on the horizon.  His long deceased daughter Jennifer, who frequents the novels in the ghostly form of a protector for her father, intimates that Parker’s story is coming to a pivotal crossroads and I can’t wait to see what Connolly has up his sleeve.