Digital Reads Reviews

My review
The blurb sounded so interesting that I had to pick this book up to read. And it didn’t disappoint me totally. As any book there were good parts and some not so…  

As the blurb says, Madison disappears, no clues, police assume her to be dead, frozen under snow, parents still in hope. So enter the Child Finder Naomi and the story progresses in leaps and bounds with a few falls… 

Rene Denfeld is a great writer, her plot is absolutely intriguing, and her characterisation and descriptions are striking. Rene has made her main character encased in reality. There is no super hero or a super power in this Child Finder, she is not intuitive or psychic to be called so. But the one thing she has, is determination and perseverance. OK,  that makes it two things.. 

A woman who had been lost as a child and is still lost in the pages of her forgotten past, with a fear and hesitancy to get close to anyone, with a wall around her to prevent others to know her, is as flawed as it comes. But this is what makes her interesting. I love main characters like Naomi who can rise above her past, to know and understand her future. 

The book is written in dual view points, from both Naomi and a snow child. The book touches on tough topics like child abuse and kidnapping. Naomi herself was kidnapped and probably abused as a child, and while locating other children, her brain slowly heals and unlocks her own past as dreams.

There is parallel short story in this book, of Naomi locating another child which was absolutely enthralling and equally heartbreaking. I had goosebumps when I read that. 

The original plot line has hiccups. The flow of the story is staccato but it is Naomi who holds the attention, so one can’t help but continue on. 

Naomi finds out in her methodical search that many years ago there was a paedophile in the mountains who was accused but never charged. Why did the police not follow up on that or even know about him?? 

Naomi’s methods of detection are just logical and understanding the landscape and minds of parents. Yet the police with their vast resources could not do that. 

Why I would continue with this series is only to get to know Naomi and to find the child in the Child Finder… 

My rating : 3.5 stars 

About the Author 

Rene Denfeld is an internationally bestselling author, journalist, and licensed investigator specializing in death penalty work. She has written for the New York Times Magazine, the Oregonian, and the Philadelphia Inquirer. She is also the author of the award-winning novel The Enchanted as well as three works of nonfiction.

Book blurb 

Three years ago, Madison Culver disappeared when her family was choosing a Christmas tree in Oregon’s Skookum National Forest. Desperate to find their beloved daughter, certain someone took her, the Culvers turn to Naomi, a private investigator with an uncanny talent for locating the lost and missing. Known to the police and a select group of parents as “the Child Finder,” Naomi is their last hope.

Naomi’s methodical search takes her deep into the icy, mysterious forest in the Pacific Northwest, and into her own fragmented past. She understands children like Madison because once upon a time, she was a lost girl, too.

Told in the alternating voices of Naomi and a deeply imaginative child, The Child Finder is a breathtaking, exquisitely rendered literary page-turner about redemption, the line between reality and memories and dreams, and the human capacity to survive. 

Product Details 

Publication date : 5th September 2017

Publisher : Harper

Language : English

Available on Amazon