Book Review: THEY DISAPPEARED

It is always fun to find a "new" author and I just read my first book by Rick Mofina. The title, They Disappeared, gave me a hint of what the story line might be, so I was ready for a fast action afternoon.

Jeff Griffin and his wife, Sarah have come to New York City  to give Cole, their nine-year-old son, a trip that he has been dreaming about. Jeff also hopes to repair his marriage. Jeff and Sarah's relationship had been badly torn apart by the death of their infant daughter and he feels that returning to the place where they had first gotten to know each other might help them.The family arrives in Manhattan as the city prepares for a meeting at the United Nations that involves the top leaders of the world.

At the airport, Cole's backpack is accidentally switched with an identical backpack. The correction is made, but one toy is forgotten. Later, as the family is taking pictures on Times Square, Jeff steps into a shop to get batteries for the camera and when he returns to the street he finds that his wife and son have disappeared. The usual life and death search takes us all over New York City and introduces us to many colorful characters...good and bad.

For me, They Disappeared was a bit of a disappointment. The story had a lot going for it. Jeff's frantic search for his family is richly colored by his feelings about the death of his baby girl and his need to talk to his wife before she is killed. Cole and Sarah are both real and sympathetic characters. Actually, author Mofina also did a very good job of making us understand and feel for the kidnappers.

The problem was too much description of how the police and the federal agents interacted. Getting to know the agencies working on a case can be a good thing and it can be informative to learn how these agencies cooperate. But, I felt over whelmed by the mass of details and the names of all the people involved. Some times too many characters weaken a book, even if the characters are well drawn. At times, these details ruined the flow of the action for me.

This is not to say that I will not try another book by Rick Mofina. His list of titles is long and this may have been a case of his needing to get a book published because the mortgage was due. Sometimes an author's earlier work is his best. We will check that out.