Close to Home (DI Adam Fawley, #1)

Title: Close to Home (DI Adam Fawley, #1)

Author: Cara Hunter

Published in: 2017

Date read: 3rd February 2018

Score: 5/5

Genre: Crime, Detective, Mystery, Thriller

Plot: (Warning, may contain spoilers):
"Close to Home" by Cara Hunter is the debut novel in her Detective Inspector Adam Fawley series, focusing on a chilling missing persons case in a seemingly ordinary Oxford suburb.

The story begins with the disappearance of eight-year-old Daisy Mason from a family party at her home. The quiet suburban street and the family themselves offer little immediate explanation. Detective Inspector Adam Fawley and his team are brought in to investigate, and they immediately face a perplexing situation: despite numerous guests and neighbors, no one can definitively say when or where Daisy was last seen.

As Fawley delves into the family, he uncovers a household riddled with secrets and dysfunction beneath a veneer of respectability. Daisy's mother seems overly concerned with appearances, her father is defensive and evasive, and her older brother, Leo, is withdrawn and uncommunicative. The police realise that in most child abduction cases, the perpetrator is someone known to the victim, meaning someone close to Daisy is likely lying.

The investigation unfolds with a mix of traditional police procedural work, including interviews and forensic analysis, alongside modern elements like social media posts and news reports, which provide public commentary and pressure. As Fawley and his team work against the clock, they find themselves sifting through a growing number of suspects and a tangled web of family secrets, past grievances, and hidden desires. The deeper they dig, the more unsettling the truths about the Mason family and their seemingly perfect life become.

The novel is a tense and twisty ride, constantly challenging the reader's assumptions. It's a race against time to discover what happened to Daisy Mason, uncovering the dark secrets that lie "close to home" and exploring the devastating impact of a child's disappearance on a community.

Comments:
Read this as an "unknown author" and will certainly read more by Cara when they crop up.

Books that we've read by Cara Hunter (1):
Close to Home (DI Adam Fawley, #1) (2017)