Frankie Elkin, white, middle-aged, and a recovering alcoholic, has a unique occupation. As a civilian she looks for missing people. These are cold cases or cases where the police have given up looking. She has been remarkably successful finding the last sixteen people she looked for. The problem is these people were all dead. She’d like to recover someone living.
Her latest case brings her to Mattapan, a suburb of Boston populated primarily by Haitians. This is a neighborhood where she stands out and many of the residents are not happy about her or the fact that she’s looking for the missing girl.
Angelique Badeau is a teenager who disappeared after leaving her high school. There are no clues and the police have stopped looking. She was an intelligent girl who hoped to go to college. Frankie comes to be trusted by Angelique’s mother and brother. When another girl, a close friend of Angelique’s, is found dead, even the police are glad of Frankie’s help.
As with other Gardener books, this one has plenty of action. Frankie is a good heroine. She keeps on with her quest even when it might mean her own death. I enjoyed that part of the book. However, the book starts with an extended nightmare which is a bit off-putting. I also found the constant attention paid to the race of the characters a bit too much.
However, on the positive side, the minor characters were well portrayed. I’d like to see more of them. I particularly loved the crazy cat Frankie shared the apartment with.
I received this book from Penguin Random House for this review.
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