The Never Game: Signed

The Never Game is the first book in the Colter Shaw series by American author, Jeffery Deaver. Some people call Colter Shaw a mercenary. Not the fight-for-money kind. Colter makes a living by finding missing people for the reward offered. And he's good at it. From a young age, his parents instilled into their children survival skills unlike any most parents would select. It's stood him in good stead.

His latest case takes him to Silicone Valley, where a nineteen-year-old student, Sophie Mulliner, has gone missing. The local cops aren't doing much, convinced she's a runaway, so Frank Mulliner offers a reward. Colter gets the information, works out the probabilities, finds the evidence of kidnapping, doing everything the police should have. And he finds the girl. Job done. Except…

There are some strange aspects to this case. And there was a murder committed during the rescue. And then, hours later, there is another kidnapping. And another. It's starting to look like the killer is playing a game, enacting a particular computer game. By this time the police actually want Colter's help.

Colter Shaw is an interesting protagonist: highly skilled, always calculating the odds, assessing the probabilities, and usually making only informed decisions, even when faced with a mountain lion. The reader learns about his unconventional upbringing via flashbacks that intersperse the present-day narrative. There's also an unresolved thread underlying Colter's current cases, which is gradually revealed in those flashbacks, relating to a shocking event that occurred fifteen years earlier.

While the story does include quite a bit about gaming, this is fairly subtly done. There are plenty of twists and red herrings and, as well as setting up the case Colter will next be dealing with, Deaver leaves enough unanswered questions in Colter's background for future instalments. A page-turner.