Seconds Away

Taking up the story exactly where the first installment of Mickey Bolitar's adventures left off, this action-packed young adult thriller follows high school sophomore Mickey and his friends Ema and Spoon, as they continue to unravel the secrets surrounding the mysterious Abonea Shelter and the untimely death of Mickey's father.

Having forged an unlikely allegiance with popular classmate Rachel, Mickey is shocked to discover that she has been shot, and her mother has been murdered. But why? Could it have anything to do with Rachel's involvement with the Abonea Shelter - and why is Rachel's father behaving suspiciously? Determined to protect Rachel, Mickey and his friends soon find themselves over their heads, uncovering more questions than they find answers, and encountering more danger than ever before.

Harlan Coben offers up plenty of excitement and suspense in this pacy, well-plotted page-turner that will keep readers guessing all the way through.  Mickey is an engaging and sympathetic central character facing a host of complex moral dilemmas, whilst his idiosyncratic friends Ema, Spoon and Rachel make a welcome change from the sometimes cliched characters in many of the new breed of young adult crime thrillers. Altogether, Seconds Away is an engrossing, thrill-a-minute mystery, although its worth noting that those who have not already read the first Mickey Bolitar book, Shelter, may struggle to make sense of the twists and turns of the plot.