What Follows After

April 15, 2014
Scott and Gina are living a lie. For almost a year they have managed to fool their families into thinking their marriage was still intact. Their two young sons, Colt and Timmy, tired of lying about their parents' separation, decide to run away to their aunt and uncle's house in Georgia. While at a rest stop on their bus journey from Florida, Timmy is abducted. Walsh ("The Reunion") effectively uses the adult Colt's flashbacks and his childhood memories of guilt for his failure to protect his brother to create a heartrending story. VERDICT Three-time Carol Award-winning author Walsh excels once again with this psychological thriller. Child abduction is every parent's worst nightmare, and the author's narrative moves at a relentless pace, with tension building to an almost unbearable degree until the very end.

Copyright 2014 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

March 15, 2014
The world is on edge in 1962 as the Cuban missile crisis forces ordinary citizens to face their mortality and question their choices. For the Harrisons, that fear becomes much more personal when their youngest son, Timmy, is kidnapped after an attempt to run away from home with his brother, Colt. In the wake of his disappearance, his parents, Gina and Scott, are forced back together after being separated for nearly a year, and they end up confronting old issues as they search for their son. As Timmy is trapped and fearful, hoping to be saved, and his family is filled with dread and guilt about their roles in his disappearance, award-winning Walsh (The Promise, 2013) explores the ways fear drives us in this compelling take on a family's worst nightmare, which is assuaged only by faith in God. As their world crumbles and the Harrisons feel less in control, the good that comes out of their dark situation points to the fulfillment of their faithfulness in the God they sought when they had nowhere else to turn.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2014, American Library Association.)