Lost and Never Found by Simon Mason
This is the third book in a critically well-received series of crime fiction featuring DI Ray Wilkins and DI Ryan Wilkins, two Oxford police officers. Theirs is a familiar odd couple partnership: they are not related and are from different sides of the track. Ryan comes from a socially disadvantaged, dysfunctional background. Undoubtedly sharp and driven, he is also unconventional and awkward in everyday social situations. His compulsive, erratic personality suggests some form of special needs. Ray is a good looking, well-dressed and talented officer – precise, analytical and well-organised. He is privately educated, ambitious and personally sorted, with a happy family life; he is also black.
Despite these diametric differences, Ray and Ryan are friends who respect one another’s policing abilities as well as their personal differences. Yet at the start of this story their relationship is placed under some strain. Despite Ray having just received an award for his bravery in the line of duty, Ryan has been asked to lead a high profile missing person investigation, with Ray as part of his team.
A distinctive Rolls Royce belonging to upper class socialite and tabloid celebrity, Zara Fanshawe, is found crashed and abandoned in a seedy part of Oxford, with no sign of its owner. Understandably, Zara’s disappearance causes a media frenzy which Ryan singularly fails to calm in a disastrous press conference. His instincts tell him, though, that there is more to this disappearance than meets the eye. However, his unconventional approach to the investigation that involves strong-arming potential witnesses and ignoring procedure when it slows down the quicksilver connections his brain makes, stretch his superior’s patience. Even Ray is disgruntled, believing that he could and should be leading the high-profile case and, as he believes, more successfully.
Avoiding spoilers as ever, it’s no surprise when Ryan manages to link Zara’s disappearance with past secrets and crimes that draw in a disparate range of characters, including the homeless community in Oxford and another very different woman from Zara who has vanished. The plotting of the central mystery is precise and its intertwining complexity is handled confidently by Mason. All the characters have a backstory and are fully developed and, despite Ryan’s extreme unconventionality, the procedural aspects of the investigation – the interviews, press conferences, routine plod work – seem authentic.
I had two issues, though. When the denouement occurs, there was something of a deus ex machina about the resolution. After a couple of red herrings, Mason provided all the clues as to who had committed all the crimes and why. However, it still seemed an overly quick and pat conclusion. That leads me on to my second issue and the thing that actually made this an absorbing read. The USP of this series is the relationship between the two Wilkins. Both men, despite their surface differences, are natural policemen driven by a sense of justice and the adrenaline of the investigation. They also share something from their very different backgrounds – a desire to prove themselves. However, despite the rich black comedy that comes from Ryan’s social dysfunction, I simply don’t believe he would ever have made it into such a relatively senior position. Nevertheless, the quality of the characterisation and the way the layers of plot gradually unfolded meant that I was willing to suspend my disbelief and enjoy the ride.