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GONE, Jonathan Kellerman's latest Alex Delaware/Milo Sturgis novel, begins with the disappearance of a young man and woman who are fellow students at an erstwhile acting school. When the couple reappears in dramatic fashion a few days later, they tell a harrowing story of abduction that quickly unravels and ultimately turns out to be a hoax. Some months later, one of them is found brutally murdered while the other goes missing. Delaware and Sturgis begin their investigation into the killing, working together like a pair of comfortable if somewhat mismatched shoes and painstakingly gathering clues, all the while discovering that the murder and disappearance are merely the tip of a very quiet yet deadly iceberg that may well have claimed more than one victim.
It seems as if GONE will proceed along this plotline until one of the characters is pinned with the murder. But as readers will soon discover, this work is much more than a tribute to dogged and ultimately noble police work. Retained in his psychiatric capacity as a witness against a colleague accused of sexual assault, Delaware finds that the matter spills over into his personal life, with a result that is somewhat unexpected.
As has been his wont in previous Delaware/Sturgis books, Kellerman utilizes his protagonists' investigations against the backdrop of modern-day Los Angeles, providing a subtle, quiet and striking triptych and sociological commentary along the way. One example: near the end of GONE, Delaware and Sturgis meet with a new and ultimately dispositive witness who provides information that is the key to resolving the investigation. They meet at Musso & Frank Grill, a Hollywood institution that a friend of mine once described as being "older than Bea Arthur." Kellerman's description of the place's ambience, set out in a few intermittent and unobtrusive sentences, is such that it is almost impossible to resist the urge to travel to Los Angeles to visit the establishment.
There are more examples throughout the book and, indeed, the entire series. Meanwhile, Kellerman uses these passages to move, rather than rest, the narrative as it steadily runs toward a harrowing and horrifying conclusion.
With GONE, Kellerman continues his practice of publishing a novel better than his previous ones while subtly implying that there are better things to come. It is hard to believe, however, that it will get any better than GONE. Highly recommended.
--- Reviewed by Joe Hartlaub
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