Title: Missing in Mexico
Author: Stuart Gustafson
Publisher: AITEpublishing.com
Genre: Mystery
Kindle eBook: $2.99
ASIN: B004HW6FIS
Trade Paperback: $14.95
ISBN-10: 0977172740
ISBN-13: 978-0977172740
Author’s website: www.stuartgustafson.com/books-tools.html
Missing in Mexico is a fine first novel, filled with a genuine
sense of place and easy-to-read prose. Many debut novelists fall prey to overwritten
prose with too many adverbs or adjectives, excessive “telling,” and laborious
narratives. Mr. Gustafson has, for the most part, avoided those traps, and does
a good job of simply telling the story in a natural style. Gustafson also
includes a bit of education at the beginning of each chapter, where he provides
us with a simple Spanish lesson. I enjoyed this aspect of the novel because
although I’ve studied French and German, I’d only taken on semester of Spanish
in high school and the memory-jogging was fun.
When Robert and Tina Johnson visit Mexico with their
daughter Sarah and her best friend Mary, they had no premonition of the
impending horror they were about to endure. When the joint vacation is over,
they leave the girls (both college freshmen) to enjoy a few extended days in
Los Cabos, an area they deemed quite safe, knowing the girls needed a little
time to unwind before returning to college after Christmas break.
When Mary gets on the plane with Sarah right behind her,
she’s shocked when the girl doesn’t show after making a beeline for a last minute
purchase. The plane leaves without Sarah, and the mystery begins.
Did Sarah miss the plane on purpose? Or did someone kidnap
her? Is she alive? Or dead? The most important question, however, is whether Stan
Walkorski—the private eye the Johnson’s hired—will find the girl in this strange
but beautiful land.
The author has achieved a great start to his series here,
buoyed by his extensive knowledge of the land of Los Cabos, Mexico. While his
travel knowledge sometimes crept into the story a bit too often to maintain
taut suspense (there was a long section about the art district that was
interesting but not crucial to the story), in general the tension was well-maintained.
Gustafson makes his readers care about Sarah and her
parents, who suffered dreadfully and imagined the worst every waking hour of
their days that stretched from weeks to months; and also about the protagonist
(Stan). I couldn’t help but wonder, however, why he became involved with a
woman he met on the plane who originated from the Los Cabos area, and then just
let the woman go without really fighting to find her. (I really liked her and
was very disappointed when that didn’t work out and he started seeing a new
woman he also met on the plane.). In real life, things like this do happen, so
I chalked it up to the author’s right to choose.
As a last note, I do believe the title is a real winner –
how can anyone resist a mystery named “Missing in Mexico?” I’ll be interested
to see how this author progresses in his travel mystery series, and where he’ll
take us next!
Review by Aaron Paul Lazar, www.lazarbooks.com.
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