BOOK REVIEW: BAD MAN BY DATHAN AUERBACH

I’d heard a lot of great things about Bad Man by Dathan Auerbach earlier this year, so I requested this book from my library’s interlibrary loan because my library didn’t have a copy on its own shelves.  It FINALLY came in and I dove right into it. It was hard to put down. This is the first book I’ve read by Dathan and I plan to read more of his work.

The story’s main character is a young man named Ben.  Ben had taken his three-year-old brother, Eric, to the supermarket one afternoon while his parents were at work.  Ben had taken Eric to the restroom and had turned toward the sink only for a minute - when he turned back, Eric was missing.  Ben tore through the store looking for Eric, calling his name and asking everyone in the store if they’d seen his little brother.

On that day and on every day in the five years between then and now, Eric was never found.

This has to be a sibling’s/parent’s/relative’s worst nightmare.  A missing child is a nightmare in itself, but to have a toddler disappear while you are supposed to be responsible for them...that must be the most nauseating, the-bottom-has-dropped-out-beneath-me feeling.

So that’s how the book starts, and the nightmare continues.

Ben searched tirelessly for years.  He put Missing Child fliers up all over town.  He went door-to-door with copies of the fliers to anyone living remotely near the store asking the residents if they’d seen Eric.  Hell, even when he noticed that any of the houses were sold and new people moved in, he would take the flier to the new people to ask them to be on the lookout for Eric.  Ben was also a frequent visitor to the local police department, asking if any new leads had been called in and demanding that the police search for his brother just as intensely now, years later, as they had been in the first few days after Eric’s disappearance.

Ben’s home life had never been the same since Eric’s disappearance (understandably so).  His step-mom Deidre no longer works and spends her days roaming the house or spending time in Eric’s room, humming or talking to her lost boy.  Ben’s father is a ghost of the man he was, working hard to make ends meet. Life at home becomes even more tenuous when Ben takes a night-shift job at the same supermarket from which Eric disappeared, but it was the last place in town that had accepted his application.

Working at this supermarket was hard for Ben.  His brother’s Missing Child flier was still hanging on the bulletin board along with all of the other missing kids, so he must walk past that every day.  His new boss is cruel and uncaring, and Ben suspects he may know something about his brother’s disappearance and never told the police. Plus there are strange noises coming from strange places in the supermarket at night, and a haunting energy seems to run through the place that Ben can’t exactly pinpoint.

Ben still searches for Eric when he’s not working.  When a coworker learns more about Ben and his relation to Eric, he claims he’d seen the boy a few months ago, alive.  Ben’s efforts become even more fervent and he notices some strange coincidences. And a haunting symbol started cropping up in different places at work, and Ben is convinced they are related to Eric’s disappearance.

That’s enough about the plot - I don’t want to give anything away.  I want the story to unfold as unexpectedly for you as it did for me!  The book is full of mystery, pain and the undying efforts of a young man looking for his lost brother.

I really like Dathan’s writing style.  He has a very lovely way of describing the setting, people, and the actions around you.  He could describe the way the wind moved so that you could see it without seeing anything the wind was carrying.  He could describe a person so that you could feel their presence. Everything in the book felt so real and tangible it was hard to imagine you weren’t seeing it on film.

I will admit that the book felt a little too long and that the plot was a little more complex for me than I like, so sometimes it was hard for me to follow or tie things together.  And I’m a little undecided about the ending, which is the only reason the book didn’t receive 5 stars from me. I feel like I’m missing some pieces to the puzzle. I tend to be someone who wants everything to fall into place or come to light by the end.  I felt like there were some plot holes that I expected would be filled in, but I didn’t catch the revelations if they were there.

Overall Bad Man is well worth the read.  I look forward to reading Dathan’s Penpal as well.