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    The Missing: A Novel
    The Missing: A Novel
    The Missing: A Novel
    Audiobook9 hours

    The Missing: A Novel

    Written by C.L. Taylor

    Narrated by Clare Corbett

    3.5/5

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    About this audiobook

    In this harrowing psychological thriller about a missing teenage boy whose mother must expose the secrets within their own family if she wants to find her son—perfect for fans of Reconstructing Amelia.

    You love your family. They make you feel safe. You trust them. Or do you…?

    When fifteen-year-old Billy Wilkinson goes missing in the middle of the night, his mother, Claire Wilkinson, blames herself. She’s not the only one. There isn’t a single member of Billy’s family that doesn’t feel guilty. But the Wilkinsons are so used to keeping secrets from one another that it isn’t until six months later, after an appeal for information goes horribly wrong, that the truth begins to surface.

    Claire is sure of two things—that Billy is still alive and that her friends and family had nothing to do with his disappearance.

    A mother’s instinct is never wrong. Or is it…?

    Combining an unreliable narrator and fast-paced storytelling, The Missing is a chilling novel of psychological suspense that will thoroughly captivate and obsess listeners.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherHarperAudio
    Release dateNov 7, 2017
    ISBN9780062836281
    Author

    C.L. Taylor

    C.L. Taylor is a Sunday Times bestselling author. Her psychological thrillers have sold over a million copies in the UK alone, been translated into over twenty languages, and optioned for television. Her 2019 novel, Sleep, was a Richard and Judy pick. C.L. Taylor lives in Bristol with her partner and son.

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    Reviews for The Missing

    3.5/5

    96 ratings10 reviews

    What did you think?

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    Review must be at least 10 words

    • 3/5
      This is a mix between zombie novel and a vampire novel. The infected don't die; instead the virus changes them, altering their physiology to meet its needs. They feed, eating every part of flesh from the bodies (zombie). They also have mind reading abilities and light sensitivity that forces them to sleep during the day (vampire). The mix works fairly well.

      The story is told from the point of view of multiple characters, those who live in the small town that will become ground zero for the plague. I was fairly impressed at Langan's ability to give each character depth and complexity in each small chapter, though a couple of them who fell into the cookie cutter range.

      It was a strange thing that as the story progressed, I slowly began to like the characters less and less instead of the other way around. I eventually didn't care much what happened to them.

      Despite not loving the characters, this was a fast paced novel, an easy, lightweight read, and just what I needed at the moment.

      I didn't realize that this was the second book in a series when I picked it up. The story just kind of ends and it feels very much like it's still in the middle of things. I enjoyed this enough that I'm curious to go read about the events that are hinted at in the first book. And I'd be interested in following, what happens next, as well.
    • 2/5
      I'm not entirely sure what to make of this book...
      As the POV switched so often, I didn't feel any sort of attachment to any of the characters, so the deaths really didn't mean much to me. I thought it was interesting how the reader never really quite got to see exactly what the infected did, from a POV chapter. Everything was hinted at, through the remains of the people and animals - and although it was obvious what went on, without a full description of it, it felt like the reader was partially in the dark, like the infected when they attacked.
      As I mentioned previously, none of the characters really drew me in. There were quite a lot of stereotypes - Maddie especially annoyed me; I just really hate the overuse of teen slang in books. Lois was a complete sap. I still don't understand why the virus centred around her, why she was in control, and why Fenstad's family lasted the longest.
      Quite a grim read, although I'm not sure what I was really expecting from the blurb!

      Also posted on my blog, Rinn Reads.
    • 3/5
      Sarah Langan sure does like Stephen King. Perhaps she doesn't realize how much he's rolling around in her head, but it seems like she went looking for her voice and found his instead. Her stories read like the kind of dream you would have if you took a King novel to bed and woke up the next morning, with a plot of your own rolling around that you struggle to make sense of. I picked this one up because my library said it was a zombie book, and I had a zombie research project of sorts in the works. It's not really a zombie book. Well, it is in that there is a contagion in the town that appears to turn those affected into flesh-eaters - but it's very unclear how this happens, and generalized evil dreck from the site of a former supernatural tragedy has a large part to play in this. I would argue that Langan is working out her Stephen King issues in a big way here, and that what the people in this town really have is whatever was in the bottom of the mine in King's Desperation. Same symptoms. The changed are crazy and antisocial, but not mindless, and they have the same weird gore/respiratory symptoms as did those touched by Tak. Maybe a little of The Tommyknockers thrown in, and a definite nod to Straub's Eyes of the Dragon - the prologue narrator's husband is like a character straight out of that book.The biggest problem with Langan is that all of her characters seemed to be crazy going in, so it's hard to tell who's been affected, and whether they would have been any better off if they managed to escape. Another of her books, Audrey's Door, which is Langan's version of The Shining/Haunting of Hill House, demonstrated this phenomenon the best. The main character meets a doorman - over the course of a very superficial conversation decides he wants her body, no, wait, he thinks of her as his daughter. She insults his parenting and implies that the daughter he briefly mentions is crazy, then decides he's fatherly and she likes him. What??? In the beginning of Langan's The Keeper, there is a sentence that says, effectively, that the whole town, while obsessing about the crazy main character, had decided their other problems were worse and, AS A GROUP, without speaking to one another about it, decided to stop thinking about/discussing her. Does this seem likely to you? Reading Langan is like watching the Brontes write King. And yet, I think I'm giving the impression here that this book, and Langan's other works, are awful. Literary merit aside, they ARE compelling. It's that dream quality they have, I think. I'd give them a chance. It's like a tale told late at night, by the fireside. Sometimes everything doesn't always have to make sense.
    • 3/5
      Sarah Langan sure does like Stephen King. Perhaps she doesn't realize how much he's rolling around in her head, but it seems like she went looking for her voice and found his instead. Her stories read like the kind of dream you would have if you took a King novel to bed and woke up the next morning, with a plot of your own rolling around that you struggle to make sense of.

      I picked this one up because my library said it was a zombie book, and I had a zombie research project of sorts in the works. It's not really a zombie book. Well, it is in that there is a contagion in the town that appears to turn those affected into flesh-eaters - but it's very unclear how this happens, and generalized evil dreck from the site of a former supernatural tragedy has a large part to play in this. I would argue that Langan is working out her Stephen King issues in a big way here, and that what the people in this town really have is whatever was in the bottom of the mine in King's Desperation. Same symptoms. The changed are crazy and antisocial, but not mindless, and they have the same weird gore/respiratory symptoms as did those touched by Tak. Maybe a little of The Tommyknockers thrown in, and a definite nod to Straub's Eyes of the Dragon - the prologue narrator's husband is like a character straight out of that book.

      The biggest problem with Langan is that all of her characters seemed to be crazy going in, so it's hard to tell who's been affected, and whether they would have been any better off if they managed to escape.

      Another of her books, Audrey's Door, which is Langan's version of The Shining/Haunting of Hill House, demonstrated this phenomenon the best. The main character meets a doorman - over the course of a very superficial conversation decides he wants her body, no, wait, he thinks of her as his daughter. She insults his parenting and implies that the daughter he briefly mentions is crazy, then decides he's fatherly and she likes him. What???

      In the beginning of Langan's The Keeper, there is a sentence that says, effectively, that the whole town, while obsessing about the crazy main character, had decided their other problems were worse and, AS A GROUP, without speaking to one another about it, decided to stop thinking about/discussing her. Does this seem likely to you?
      Reading Langan is like watching the Brontes write King.

      And yet, I think I'm giving the impression here that this book, and Langan's other works, are awful. Literary merit aside, they ARE compelling. It's that dream quality they have, I think. I'd give them a chance. It's like a tale told late at night, by the fireside. Sometimes everything doesn't always have to make sense.
    • 2/5
      In The Missing, an industrial accident unleashes a virus that creates zombie-like flesh eaters, feasting on an affluent town in Maine.

      I picked this up as my annual Halloween read, but it didn't do much for me. The story and characters were interesting enough, in a soap-opera kind of way, but there was way too much grade-school gore, and not nearly enough terror. I like my horror novels to be truly frightening, to follow me around for days (I'm thinking of The Haunting of Hill House, or early Stephen King). This one was just not scary.
    • 3/5
      Virus is frightening, creepy, and definitely not to be read at night. The characters and plot are very believable, as are the actions of many of the residents of Corpus Christi. The story itself is easy to read but difficult to put down. With a style reminiscent of early Stephen King, Virus delivers genuine tension and thrills as well as a desire to continue reading. This book is a scary read and highly recommended. Langlan is an author to watch in future. I genuinely believe we will see good things from her.
    • 2/5
      Virus is a short story masquerading as a novel where the plot centres around a virus, of psychological power, or potentially of the realm of the supernatural. Each chapter is a struggle to complete as the myriad of characters meander off-plot almost incessantly, with their histories told usually paragraphs before they expire, which somewhat removes any page-turning qualities. There are striking similarities to her previous book, The Keeper, which unfortunately carried the same issues (and some similar parts of the plot too). Overall, Virus has no likeable characters, at times is hard to follow and ultimately offers little reward for actually getting through it.
    • 4/5
      I thoroughly enjoyed this book as much as I enjoyed The Keeper. Now with this book, we were in the town over from Bedford where the last one took place. She so reminds me of Stephen King. This book had everything from exotic descriptions to the horror that I have come to love so much.

      Things happen so slowly, yet so fast. First of all with the class trip to Bedford, a young boy named James takes it upon himself to get lost and then the voices talk to him. They know what he wants, what he is like. Then he is attacked and killed by animals. The dirt in Bedford is squishy like it's made up of blood. It even smells like it. With Ms. Langan's descriptions, you can practically see everything and everyone in this book. Everyone in the town seems to know that something is coming, but they aren't sure when or where, but they know that it's coming. It's a tale of survival and not letting the madness take over your mind. Even the reader knows something is coming, but not sure when and where it's going to happen.

      The infection seems to move quickly. People end up getting sick and guess what ... these people are dead and turned into zombies, more or less. Oh, and we all know how I love these kinds of books. The tone of the book is dark, which is why it had it's appeal for me. It's an edge of your seat tale of nail-biting terror.
    • 2/5
      Pretty darn good for 250 pages, but then it unfortunately limps to the finish line. Not a bad Halloween book, but I liked her first one better.
    • 5/5
      The town of Corpus Christi, Maine, is a nice middle-class suburb where life is quiet, until a class field trip disturbs something better left sleeping. Very quickly, a sickness spreads through town - but this is no ordinary virus. It preys on a person's deepest fears and failures, and turns its victims into something very different from human.

      Sarah Langan has crafted a great story that starts with a set of flawed characters, then ratchets up the horror until the story becomes apocaplyptic. This is one creepy story. It's a sequel to The Keeper, her previous novel, but the stories are only loosely connected. If you want the full effect, read 'em in order, but The Missing certainly stands on its own.