California Dreamer
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69. Village of the Lost Girls, by Agustin Martinez
Set in a village in the Pyrenees, Village of the Lost Girls is a police procedural about the disappearance of two young girls. Five years after they went missing there is a car crash and one of the missing girls, Ana, is found to be a survivor of the crash.
Inspector Sara Campos comes to Monteperdido with her boss Santiago to investigate the disappearance and lead the search for the other girl, Lucia. The two are quickly confronted by a kind of village omerta as well as with Lucia's father getting impatient with the investigation and trying to take matters into his own hands.
Sara is a damaged individual herself and finds that the case of the missing girls strikes her close to the bone, a matter which deteriorates as the book goes on. As she encounters multiple dead ends she seems to be coming apart, but manages to pull herself together each time. Sara is the kind of protagonist you can really get behind.
Martinez's plot kept me guessing and his description of the Pyrenees countryside and lifestyle was evocative and compelling. It's an unusual setting for a crime novel and I thought it added a great deal to the book.
Set in a village in the Pyrenees, Village of the Lost Girls is a police procedural about the disappearance of two young girls. Five years after they went missing there is a car crash and one of the missing girls, Ana, is found to be a survivor of the crash.
Inspector Sara Campos comes to Monteperdido with her boss Santiago to investigate the disappearance and lead the search for the other girl, Lucia. The two are quickly confronted by a kind of village omerta as well as with Lucia's father getting impatient with the investigation and trying to take matters into his own hands.
Sara is a damaged individual herself and finds that the case of the missing girls strikes her close to the bone, a matter which deteriorates as the book goes on. As she encounters multiple dead ends she seems to be coming apart, but manages to pull herself together each time. Sara is the kind of protagonist you can really get behind.
Martinez's plot kept me guessing and his description of the Pyrenees countryside and lifestyle was evocative and compelling. It's an unusual setting for a crime novel and I thought it added a great deal to the book.