Run Away by Harlan Coben

 

Run Away by Harlan Coben is not the kind of book I normally pick up. This is one of those thriller/suspense novels that you buy in an airport to make a dull flight bearable. One of those books where the author's name is featured more prominently on the cover than the title. Don't get me wrong--I'm not looking down my nose at that type of story at all. They just aren't the type of books I usually choose. I tend to read them too quickly and forget all the details mere minutes afterwards, making the experience more fleeting than what I want. Every once in a while though, I get in the mood for something fast-paced and exciting, so here we are. I ended up buying this one because I heard a good review for it on YouTube and figured that it would be a good one to use to scratch that itch when I was once again in the thriller mood. I found myself in that place this month, so I finally gave it a shot.

The plot of the novel follows Simon Greene, a financial advisor living in New York with his wife and children. He used to have a picture perfect family life until his oldest daughter, Paige, left home to go to college and fell in with a shady boyfriend named Aaron that got her addicted to drugs. Simon and his wife have tried everything over the past several months to help her, including several stints in rehab, but she keeps returning to Aaron and her addiction. As the story begins, Simon see Paige in Central Park, playing a guitar for tips. She looks terrible, and he is unable to just walk away. He calls her name in an effort to try, once again, to bring her home, and she runs.

Simon takes off after her, and from that moment forward, he is drawn into a dangerous world full of drugs, violence, and secrets that threated to unravel everything in his life that he has worked so hard to build. Although he finds himself in increasingly tenuous situations, Simon is determined to do whatever it takes to figure out what is going on with Paige, help her get clean, and bring her back to being the daughter he once knew again.

I thought this novel was pretty good, and it definitely served its purpose of giving me a suspenseful, fast-paced read to indulge in. The action moved along at a good speed, secrets and twists were revealed at appropriate moments, and the story overall was interesting and suitably mysterious. I wouldn't say that anything about this was particularly memorable or fantastic, but it was a very competently written thriller that kept me engaged the whole time I was reading. 

I did run into one small issue with the book though, and it's not one that I'm used to experiencing. This book was clearly written for an audience that is older than me. I read a lot of young adult and middle grades fiction, so I am very familiar with what it's like to read a book that is meant for people younger than I am. I haven't really experienced it the other way around! Simply put, the protagonist of this novel has a lot of boomer energy. His ideas about fatherhood and masculinity are slightly out of date--very old-school alpha male thoughts--and a lot of the comments he makes about the people around him feel like things my dad would say. For example, he makes several comments at one point making fun of a character's man bun. At another point, he remarks negatively on how young people prefer texting over talking on the phone these days. Lots of little things like that. It wasn't enough to seriously impact how much I enjoyed the book, but it did limit how much I could like the main character. I think this novel is perfect for older guys, which is probably what a significant portion of Coben's intended audience is.

So ultimately, Run Away was a fairly entertaining read. I don't have a lot to say about it beyond that. It did what a suspense novel should do and it did it pretty well. I can't say that this will be a story that I will remember for a while, but it is one that I'm happy to have enjoyed reading in the moment. 

Challenge Tally

22 in 2022: 4/22

Total Books Read in 2022: 20