All the colours of the dark by Chris Whitaker

A skinny one-eyed kid called Patch living with his alcoholic mother, and a friendless girl called Saint raised by her bus-driver grandmother, are drawn together, their loneliness overcome by shared pirate adventures roaming in the wild woodlands behind their homes . . . until the day Patch disappears, the day that he hurled himself at the masked man attacking Misty, the pretty girl from his school.

Finding the boy that means everything to her becomes an obsession for Saint. She never gives up on him. When Saint eventually discovers him trapped in a dark cell, Patch has developed his own obsession, to find and rescue the girl that spoke to him in the dark, telling him stories that lifted his spirits and helped him keep hope. Her name is Grace. But among the names of the girls reported missing there is no Grace, no one whose case even resembles her.

Whitaker has written a gripping mystery detective story, the language is clear and concise, and the chapters are short, heightening the pace as time passes and it becomes apparent that a serial killer is still at large. As the years pass, Saint becomes an implacable police detective, determined in her belief in Patch, longing to preserve the unique relationship they had as children. While the mystery story is compelling, Whitaker’s novel is in essence a heart-rending love story, of longing and lost love. The achingly beautiful story of the two strong but forlorn characters, Patch and Saint, will stay in your memory long afterwards.

Themes: Mystery, Missing person, Detectives, Serial killer, Love, Friendship, Obsession.

Helen Eddy