Wolf

March 31, 2014
In Hayder’s unsatisfying fifth crime thriller featuring Somerset-based Det. Insp. Jack Caffrey (after 2013’s Poppet), Jack takes leave from his official duties and throws himself once again into investigating the disappearance of his older brother, Ewan, who vanished at age nine and was thought to be murdered by a local pedophile. Jack turns for help to the Walking Man, a mysteriously wise vagrant, who agrees to provide information about Ewan if Jack will try to find the owner of a lost dog named Bear. Bear escaped from her home after it was invaded by two men posing as police officers and who are keeping her owners—scientist Oliver Anchor-Ferrers; his wife, Matilda; and their 29-year-old daughter, Lucia—hostage. The reasoning behind the in-home kidnapping emerges frustratingly slowly. As Jack and the Anchor-Ferrers look for answers, each in their own way, readers will wish in vain for a cameo from Jack’s intrepid, rule-breaking sometimes partner, Flea Marley. Agent: Jane Gregory, Gregory & Co. (U.K.).