Nicci French is the pen name of a husband and wife writing team, Nicci Gerrard and Sean French. Blue Monday is the first book in a mystery series which features Freida Klein, a psychotherapist. This gives the book a different slant, having a physician rather than a detective as the sleuth. I enjoyed this book, and I will certainly look forward to reading the others in the series. It is a good summer book, full of suspense and odd characters.
The story opens in 1987 with the tale of two young sisters, on the way to a sweet shop. Joanna Vine, the younger sister disappears when her older sister, Rosie, is distracted in the sweet shop by a friend. Joanna is never found, leaving the detective in the case, frustrated and unable to let go of the unsolved mystery.
The story then switches to 2009 when Freida Klein, when treating an anxiety patient named Alan Dekker, becomes suspicious of his stories of dreams and seeming fixation on children. Alan suffers from panic attacks and compulsions he cannot seem to control. While he is being treated by Freida, another young child, Matthew Farady goes missing in an eerily similar circumstance to that of Joanna Vine.
Working with DCI Malcolm Karlsson and her medical mentor Reuben McGill (a burned out psychiatrist) Freida puts herself in danger as she pursues answers to the mysterious disappearance of Matthew which she is convinced is connected in some way to the earlier kidnapping.
The book is well written and plotted. It is a page turner and will leave you ready to delve into the next book in the series, fittingly called Tuesday's Gone.
Thanks for suggesting this mystery as I thoroughly enjoyed reading this page turner and devoured it over a weekend. I will look forward to Tuesday's Gone. I wonder if "Alan" will surface in the sequel.
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