New (to me): Linwood Barclay

I know, I know.  You're probably rolling your eyes at me right now, either because I get this excited to share these things with my fellow reading enthusiasts, or because you think that after working in libraries for nearly twelve years that there would be nothing new to me anymore.  The fact is no one, and I mean no one, ever feels as though they have enough time to read everything that they want to read, myself included.  And I'm constantly keeping my ear to the ground for recommendations from patrons and staff alike.

So, when I started to hear lots of great buzz about Linwood Barclay's latest novel, The Accident, I put it on my list of things I want to read.  If you have a list like this, then you know how long those get, and fast.  Then, when I was perusing Overdrive to find something to download onto my Kindle Fire (I make no apologies!), I came across Barclay's previous novel, 2010's Never Look Away.

Wow.  The novel's cover has a blurb from Stephen King saying the book was "the best thriller [he had] read in five years."  Obviously, I had to grab it.  And then?  I could.  Not.  Stop.  Reading.  Early for an appointment?  No problem!  Way past my bedtime?  Just one more chapter!  Ten minutes before dinner's done?  Read!

The premise is this: When David Harwood's wife, who has been acting strangely for the last few weeks, suddenly disappears during a family outing, suspicion immediately falls on David.  David, worried Jan has harmed herself, uses his skills as a journalist to try and pin down leads as to what may have happened to her.  In the process, he stumbles over an interesting tidbit--Jan's birth certificate belongs to a little girl who died more than two decades ago in a terrible accident.  So who is Jan, really?  What prompted her strange behavior?  Can David get to the bottom of it before the police decide to arrest him?  And does any of this have to do with the prison privatization story that David has been working on for the paper? 

Nerve-wracking, sinister, with so many great plot twists that left me just giddy, this is suspense at its best.  The style reminds me a bit of Harlan Coben's, so if you're a fan of Coben's work, definitely try Barclay.  Now I get to go back and read more of his work, too!

What about you?  Read anything amazing lately?  I'd love to know!