Tall Oaks -- Chris Whitaker

<p>It's rare that a novel can be both brilliantly comic and tragic, and balance the two so effortlessly. -- <i>Sun</i> <p/>Nothing is as it seems in Tall Oaks, a small California town where everyone knows each other and violent crime is unheard of. The community's idyllic façade is shattered when a kidnapper in a clown costume snatches three-year-old Harry Monroe from his own home. Despite sensational media coverage and dogged police investigations, the abduction remains a mystery. Three months later, Harry is still missing and most people have moved on, except for Jessica, Harry's distraught mother, and Jim, the local sheriff. Anyone in Tall Oaks could be a suspect: Jerry, the loner with a secret that only his mother knows; Jared, the roving lothario; teenage Manny, an aspiring gangster; and even Jessica's Aunt Henrietta and Uncle Roger, who are clearly hiding something.<br>Chris Whitaker's debut novel, with its striking blend of tragedy and offbeat humor, was awarded the U.K. Crime Writers' Association New Blood Dagger Award. <i>The Guardian</i> praised this beguiling novel as a pleasingly unusual mixture of a psychological thriller and screwball comedy, noting that the combination of verve, humor, and pathos make it well worth a read. <p/>A gripping debut. -- <i>Mail on Sunday</i> <p/>A brilliant, beautiful, sad, funny book ... It made me laugh, but also made me cry more than any other book I've read this year. -- Emma Flint, author of <i>Little Deaths</i> <p/>Completely