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Finding Sophie

A heartfelt, page turning thriller that shows how far parents will go for their child

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Finding Sophie

By: Imran Mahmood
Narrated by: Lydia Bakelmun, Oliver Hembrough
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Bloomsbury presents Finding Sophie by Imran Mahmood, read by Oliver Hembrough and Lydia Bakelmun.

'A heart-stopping thriller, a heartfelt mystery' CHRIS WHITAKER
'A clever, chilling thriller that is also unexpectedly moving' SHARI LAPENA
'Kept me guessing until the very end' IAN RANKIN
'Incredible plotting and devastatingly good writing' THE SECRET BARRISTER

Sophie King is missing.

Her parents, Harry and Zara, are distraught; for the last seventeen years, they've done everything for their beloved only daughter and now she's gone.

The police have no leads, and Harry and Zara are growing increasingly frantic, although they are both dealing with it in very different ways. Increasingly obsessed with their highly suspicious neighbour who won't open the door or answer any questions, they are both coming to the same conclusion. If they want answers, they're going to have to take the matter into their own hands.

But just how far are they both prepared to go for the love of their daughter?

'Powerfully and brilliantly written' VASEEM KHAN
'Pure brilliance' JANICE HALLETT
'Wow, what an ending!' C. L. TAYLOR
'An astonishingly twisty tale of despair, deception and desperation' LIZ NUGENT

An Observer Thriller of the Month Crime Thrillers Thriller Thriller & Suspense Crime Fiction Suspense
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Critic reviews

Kept me guessing until the very end. A courtroom drama with nice sharp teeth (Ian Rankin)
Incredible plotting and devastatingly good writing – this book deserves enormous success (The Secret Barrister)
Finding Sophie is a great thriller as well as a moving look at parental grief . . . I frequently wept while reading it but couldn’t put it down
[A] forceful, slow-burn narrative . . . handled with Grisham-like assurance
A moving yet tense read with a jaw-dropping end
I couldn't turn the pages fast enough
Nuanced, heart-breaking . . . absorbing and genuinely moving — not to be missed
I loved it, so smart and the plot twists blew me away. Imran is the only author writing about a missing person that deals with grief this well (Gillian McAllister)
The suspense is well maintained throughout ... surprising and satisfying... it is a treat to read accounts of a police investigation and court case written by someone who knows how both are conducted
A clever, chilling thriller that is also unexpectedly moving (Shari Lapena)
Finding Sophie is a rare accomplishment. By turns a heart-stopping thriller, a heartfelt mystery, and a powerful study of grief, hope, and the unbreakable bond between parent and child. Brilliant (Chris Whitaker, author of We Begin at the End)
Compelling
Wow, what an ending! An intense, desperate, heartfelt and claustrophobic story about the lengths parents will go to for love. Some books have a gut punch at the end. In Finding Sophie you're emotionally winded, all the way through (C. L. Taylor)
This thrilling and emotional roller coaster moved me tears with its powerful portrayal of the agonies of parental love and loss. Perfect for fans of Lisa Jewell, Imran Mahmood has excelled himself with this clever, heart-breaking thriller (Jo Callaghan, author of In the Blink of an Eye)
What an exciting and compulsive read! Two parents with the same goal afraid to tell each other how far they are prepared to go, but they are not the only ones keeping secrets. Imran has surpassed my expectations with an astonishingly twisty tale of despair, deception and desperation (Liz Nugent, author of Strange Sally Diamond)
Finding Sophie is a Domestic Noir objet d'art. Mahmood's writing is exceptionally beautiful for a crime genre novel. The tension he manages to weave within such accessible and recognisable human emotions is genuinely extraordinary, and the pacing hits a real punch because you spend the entire book just wanting it all to turn out all right. Brilliant, bated-breath stuff (Helen Fields, author of The Institution)
Finding Sophie by Imran Mahmood is his best yet. Beautifully written, visceral, evocative and compelling - but with a plot that keeps you guessing to the end. So much more than a legal thriller, this is a work of pure brilliance (Janice Hallett)
All stars
Most relevant
Angry teenage Sophie has gone missing and her desperate teacher parents, Zara and Harry, each believe they can solve the mystery better than the police. Mahmood’s experience as a criminal barrister has fed into this indelible, multi-layered story : drop by drop of tense court room drama,; portrayal of social issues in today’s troubled youth; psychological thriller; tender realism of the cruel effects of trauma.

The hunt for Sophie taken by each distraught parent is different as they drift apart, riven by their unfathomable grief - and both are ultimately driven to violence. We know from early on that Harry is later in court and Sophie’s body has never been found, but don’t be fooled. These interwoven court scenes change and we are kept in suspense.

We have to wait for the cleverly shifting network of threads to be worked out, but what makes Finding Sophie so satisfying is that these are real people in all their human complexities, not just players in a crime story. Sophie’s deeply loving parents being driven apart by unbearable grief is heartbreakingly real, and the ending (which I won’t give away) is realistically painful.

The narrators are excellent and particularly effective with all the dialogue.

Much more than just a "crime novel"

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Imran Mahmood raises the steaks again in his latest mind bender of a novel. Told from two perspectives and in two time lines, it sounds incredibly complex - which it is - but it makes for a tense thriller throughout. It's clear that besides his talent and flair for a darn good story, Mahmood has the legal knowledge and experience which gives his stories the edge. As the title says, the book is all about Finding Sophie. But instead of sitting back on the old tropes of the missing child, this time we are thrown into the thick of it from the outset. There's no preamble time, no typical beginning of the case we all know so well., We're weeks into the case when it feels like all leads have dried up.
Both our main characters have had their lives torn apart, and the painful sincerity deepens their characters, but drips of ambiguity and confusion fill the story.
There's little more I can say without giving spoilers away, which I won't do.
The narration is excellent, and the choice to use two narrators works perfectly with this novel.
This book is exciting, pacey, and never stops. Any fan of of Crime and Thrillers will enjoy it, but if you like films such as "Inside Man", "Law Abiding Citizen", "Se7en", and any such taut thrillers you will love this book. You COULD watch 5 films, or you could listen to this ONE book.
Choose the book.

Fantastic Plot and Characters, brilliant narration

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Had potential, no where near as good as previous books - sorry Imran but last one for me, lost any complexity…

Poor, unrealistic

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