Last Seen (DI Bernadette Noel #1) by Joy Kluver
Genre: Crime fiction, police procedural
Read: 12th March 2021
Published: 26th March 2021
★★★★ 4 stars
DESCRIPTION:
I can see her, shouting with laughter as she swings as high as she can, her beautiful blonde curls flying out behind her. I can feel her tiny hot hand in mine, and my heart aches. My little girl. If only I’d listened to my gut. Then maybe she’d be safe here with me…
When five-year-old Molly Reynolds is snatched from the park in the small village of Otterfield, Detective Bernadette ‘Bernie’ Noel throws herself into the search, sick with worry for the quiet, sensitive little girl and her distraught mother.
Wasting no time, Bernie finds a small green cardigan under a bush in the park. It still has the smiley face sticker Molly won that week at school. It’s the first in a chain of clues – and Bernie can’t shake the feeling that it was left deliberately, as a message.
But Bernie encounters a wall of silence. Otterfield is a close-knit community, yet no one in the village seems to care that Molly is missing at all. Why?
And then Bernie makes a chilling discovery: twenty-five years ago, another little girl went missing from the area. Her name was Sophie, and all they ever found of her was her teddy bear, hidden under a bush. Now Bernie knows she’s in a race against time to save Molly’s life.
Bernie’s team work round the clock to find a connection between the two girls, and just when they think they’re making progress a devastating tragedy strikes at the heart of the case. Molly’s family have been hiding a secret, and now their little girl is in greater danger than ever.
Can Bernie outwit the most warped criminal she has ever faced and bring Molly home safe, or will another innocent life be lost?
A completely addictive crime thriller with mind-blowing twists that will have you reading late into the night. If you like Val McDermid, D.S. Butler or Angela Marsons, you’ll love Joy Kluver.
MY REVIEW:
I am excited to be taking part in the #BooksOnTour #BlogTour for Joy Kluver's compelling debut crime thriller LAST SEEN.
A mother's back is turned. A child goes missing. The first 24 hours are the most crucial and with each passing hour, the chances of finding her alive continue to shrink. Door to door enquiries are undertaken but police are finding the community reluctant to help to the point of refusal. Why?
DI Bernadette "Bernie" Noel came to Wiltshire from the Met to escape. With her move came a promotion after a successful conviction in London which resulted in her receiving death threats. A move to the West Country was to put all that behind her and to protect both herself and her family. But despite her rank and her stoic exterior, Bernie is as emotional and fallible as the next person. But she cares. And that, and her tenacity, is what makes her a good detective.
Now six months later Bernie is on her way back from her grandfather's funeral in London when she receives the call and races to the scene. She arrives to find a search already underway and her crime scene trampled. With no clue as to how 5 year old Molly Reynolds left the playground, police can only surmise possible scenarios with no real idea as to what actually happened. Had Molly been taken? Was it a stranger? Was it someone known to her? Was she playing her favourite game of hide and seek and had hidden herself just a little too well? Or had she just wandered off and gotten lost? Police dogs are brought in to track her scent...but only get as far as the gate before the trail goes cold. If Molly had left the playground - which she obviously did as she was no longer there - then why does her scent end at the gate? She didn't grow wings and fly away...so where did she go?
Bernie's questions of the community fall on deaf ears. She is met with belligerence, has doors slammed in her face while others don't even answer the door! No one, it seems, wants to help find little Molly. Why is the community of Otterfield so intent on being unhelpful?
When Bernie questions distraught mother Jessica Cole, she learns that Molly has no friends and plays by herself. When they arrived at the playground after school, Molly even had to wait around half an hour before the other children left and allow her play on the equipment. Bernie found this strange behaviour and it appeared the entire community was against both Molly and her mother. But even so, wouldn't the community want to help find little Molly, regardless of how they felt about her mother?
Not only has Bernie got this troubling case on her hands, she also has office politics to deal with when her superior, DCS Wilson, announces that a new DS is being foisted upon her who "has a great deal of experience" and will take over as FLO for the family. As Bernie already had an FLO in place, she feels undermined and outranked. And given Wilson's praise of the newcomer from Scotland, that he doesn't have the faith in her to investigate this case and close with a good result.
Needless to say when DS Dougal (Dougie) Anderson arrives, swooping in to take over FLO duties, he dismisses the uniformed PC guarding the Coles' house as well as the volunteer home help Bernie called in to assist Jessica in caring for baby Sam. This leads to conflict between Anderson and Bernie as she reminds him that she is his superior officer and he had no authority to dismiss those she had put in place without first clearing it with her. It is soon clear to Bernie that DS Anderson is used to giving orders, making him something of a mystery. The fact that they don't always see eye to eye creates a simmering layer of conflict between them. Thankfully, there isn't too much of that and Anderson ends up being an essential member of Bernie's team.
The rest of Bernie's team - DS Kerry Allen and DC Matt Taylor along with Sgt Alan Turner, DCS Wilson and media liaison Jane Clackett - are an interesting bunch and despite conflicts with the latter two, the team are like a well-oiled machine that moves along smoothly. And if anyone can solve the disappearance of Molly Reynolds, it's Bernie.
The story is told in the third person perspective of Bernie throughout with the exception of little snippets, inserted every few chapters, from the villain. These fragments create another aspect to the story as we try to figure out who is behind the disappearance...and why. Part of the fun in reading crime fiction is trying to guess the culprit but Joy Kluver had me well and truly hoodwinked. Although some aspects I did manage to figure out successfully.
With a fast moving plot, there is a lot packed into LAST SEEN, from a missing 5 year old, a series of thefts at betting shops in the county and surrounds, an historic child abduction to a fact from Bernie's past she has not yet met and the underlying threats from a past case as well the ongoing power struggles and office politics. But it was all well written and each facet complemented the rest of the story.
I found it slightly ironic, however, that Bernie - who had made the move to Wiltshire to keep a low profile - spends a lot of time appearing at press conferences, interviews and in the public eye and yet still survives unscathed. If her superiors are truly aware of her circumstances, I'm sure they would have made allowances to keep her safe and out of the public eye. After all, she is meant to be keeping a low profile. But whether they are or not, I'm not sure. Surely they aren't as it would be professional suicide to place a member under their command at risk. However, I'm sure there is more to come on that front as the series progresses.
A promising start to the series, I thoroughly enjoyed LAST SEEN and look forward to reading more about Bernie and her team. I recommend this book/series to fans of crime fiction, police procedurals and those of Carol Wyer, Val McDermid, Helen Phifer, Angela Marsons and Carla Kovach.
I would like to thank #JoyKluver, #NetGalley, #Bookouture for an ARC of #LastSeen in exchange for an honest review.
MEET THE AUTHOR:
Joy is represented by Anne Williams at the Kate Horden Literary Agency.
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