I just chose this book because it was the type of book I read for fun,  it was on sale and it seemed to have a lot of good reviews.   Oh well –  you can’t win them all.    I think it was because I really didn’t like the protagonist and although this doesn’t usually bother me there really isn’t anything else to recommend the book –  it’s a fairly common plot line of females being stalked and raped but the twist is that the lead detective (or heroine?) makes herself available for this sort of activity on a regular basis.    (yuk)

*******
Missing,  Presumed
by Susie Steiner
2016 / 369 pages
read by Juanita McMahon – 12h 57m
rating –  A / crime-mystery
*******

Manon Bradshaw, a Detective Sergeant for the city of Cambridge (England) is a bit of a strange one.  Nearing the age of  40, she’s unmarried and looking,  looking hard through one-night stands and very brief flings she meets in various places.

One night,  after entertaining another disappointing man in her bed,  she is notified by the department there is a missing person.    That wouldn’t be earth-shattering except that the person is Edith Hind, the 24-year old daughter of Sir Ian Hind, doctor to royals,  and his wife Miriam.   Edith is a PhD candidate at Cambridge, but with a bit of an unknown side to her life.

When Manon arrives at the scene,  she finds Edith’s apartment in complete disarray with the door open, her coat left behind and broken glass and blood all around.  But with the Hinds, hope cannot be abandoned. So for four days the police search for Edith as a missing person.  Then a body is found in the river –  but it’s not Edith although it certainly is ominous.  So the search continues,  with the acknowledgement it’s a probable homicide.

Manon then starts interviewing the parents, the boyfriend Ryan,  and the best friend  Helena,  from a different aspect.   And everyone seems to have secrets.   Also,  Steiner uses more than this one point of view –  Miriam’s,  Ellen’s,  Ryan’s although except for that of an occasional 1st person perspective from Manon,   these are from 3rd person.

Then Manon meets Alan Bradley,  a systems analyst and a person to be interviewed.  Okay fine.  Everything she always wanted but … ? –  another suspect from a reader’s point of  view.

And there are a few more characters and complicated twists but all to keep it interesting and fun.

This is almost more of a psychological suspense novel than it is a police procedural – but the “who done it” aspect keeps it firmly in the realm of mystery.

From  NPR:   http://www.npr.org/2016/07/02/482983159/missing-presumed-brings-the-police-procedural-to-life