Monday, July 13, 2015

Coben, Harlan: Shelter

This is the first book I have read by this author who consistently hits the US best seller lists.   The
hero is a 15 year old living with his uncle in a small town near Newark as his father is dead and his
mother has brome a drug addict.   He is 6ft 4in tall and weighs 200lbs.   He has a girlfriend called Ashley who goes missing and it turns out that her supposed parents know nothing about her.   With the help of the school janitor's son, a cattish girl 'goth' and, later, the school beauty he tries to find out what happened to her.   This leads them to a sleazy strip joint where he almost overcomes the club
bouncer and to a mysterious women who was an Auschwitz escapee now running an organisation
which helps young women in need of help as long as they are considered likely to become useful
members of society.   The improbabilities along the way do not seem to matter as Coben keeps the
plot moving without superfluous explanations though he does provide some detours from the actual
mystery to flesh out the characters.  The book is the first of at least three featuring the same four
schoolchildren.   Most of the time, one all but forgets they are children in no small part due to the
maintained pace of the story.   Enjoyable and an easy read