I remember David J. Bell from the glory days of Shocklines. He was a member. Hell, everyone was. If you were involved in the world of horror fiction, as a fan or as a professional, chances are excellent that you were on Shocklines.

I read a book by Mr. Bell back then called The Girl in the Woods. It was a good one, and one that stood ahead of the small press pack at the time.

Somewhere along the way David Bell dropped the J in his name, and began authoring domestic suspense fiction. You know what I mean. Disrupted families, missing persons, twisty-turny plots, surprises along the way. I don't mean to disparage this stuff. I've read some of these type of books, and they have been really well written and involving.

I knew that Bell was writing these books, and seemed to be doing well at it. I had him on my radar and kept meaning to check them out. One afternoon I spotted a copy of Cemetery Girl at a thrift store, and I bought it. Shortly after that I read the novel, and I was blown away. Cemetery Girl deals with a teenage girl who is taken captive. That's horrifying enough, but the things that happen upon her return are even more disturbing. Cemetery Girl is a first-rate thriller, and one of the best I've read in recent memory.

So I read another: Bring Her Home. I didn't like it quite as much as Cemetery Girl, but Bring Her Home is another gripping, suspenseful, beautifully-written novel of terror that strikes far too close to home for many of us.

I still have some catching up to do with David Bell books, but I could not resist jumping into his latest thriller, Layover. Layover appears to be Bell's first major hardcover, and it looks like it could be his breakthrough novel.

Joshua Fields is a typical guy caught up in the tedious world of sales. He travels constantly, and is following in his father's footsteps into a predictable, boring life. One afternoon, during a flight layover, he meets a mysterious woman. Striking up a conversation leads to drinks, and before she makes a hasty farewell, she leaves Fields with a kiss.

He is captivated and at last disrupts his routine and against her wishes, follows her. Doing so thrusts Joshua Fields into a whirlwind of deceit, violence, and murder. At the center of it all is the mysterious woman. Is she an innocent victim caught up in a mess she didn't create? Or is she guilty of the foulest crimes? Or maybe her involvement is somewhere in the middle?

David Bell writes longish books, and I've yet to be able to guess where he is going with his plots. The mysteries thicken, the pace accelerates, and readers are as ensnared into the stories as surely as Bell's protagonists are.

I loved Layover, and while it didn't kick me in the guts as brutally as Cemetery Girl did, it is the most accomplished David Bell novel I have yet read. And where stories like this often falter in the final act, I found the ending of Layover to be completely satisfying. Perhaps even uplifting. That's a nifty trick for any thriller to pull off.

Written by Mark Sieber

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