The Homecoming: Book Two of the Niceville Trilogy (Niceville Series 2)

"Somewhere in the American South, there is a town where something is very, very wrong. A place where malicious men may die, but malice ... never. When Carsten Stroud's previous novel, Niceville, was published, Elmore Leonard wrote: "I hope Mr. Stroud, having had so much fun writing Niceville, listening to his people give him terrific dialogue, is writing a sequel or another one like it." We give you The Homecoming. Kate and Nick Kavanaugh (lawyer and cop respectively) take in young Rainey Teague, whose parents have died under mysterious circumstances. Rainey is a handful. Well, actually, Rainey is turning out to be someone--or something--downright scary: a shape-shifting time-bending little boy who will have to resist being taken over by "Nothing." Will Kate and Nick be able to save him? Will the mirror they have kept up in the attic ultimately be their downfall? When more disappearances start to happen, where do they turn? No one can explain what is happening, but everyone knows that their sleepy, peaceful town, Niceville, is turning out to be anything but nice."-- Provided by publisher From its explosive opening to its eerie climax, The Homecoming is a page-turning, labyrinthine thrill ride that returns to Niceville ... where evil lives far longer than men do. When two plane crashes set off a spellbinding chain reaction of murder, inadvertent kidnapping, corporate corruption, and financial double-dealing, it's not enough that Niceville detective Nick Kavanaugh (ex--Special Forces) has to investigate. He and his wife, family lawyer Kate, have also just taken in brutally orphaned Rainey Teague. Something bothers Nick about Rainey--and it isn't just that the woman in charge of attendance at Rainey's prep school has disappeared. In fact, people have long been disappearing from seemingly placid Niceville, including, most disturbingly, Kate's father. Using his files, Kate and Nick start to unearth Niceville's blood stained history, but something (or is it Nothing?) stands in their way. Once again, Carsten Stroud gives us unforgettable characters, including Coker, the steely, amoral police sniper, and Harvill Endicott, an urbanely manipulative psychopath, not to mention Warren Smoles, the most conniving lawyer you will ever meet. Stroud's unique storytelling gifts bring us into a world where protecting your family from the unknown becomes almost impossible but essential for survival. Anything is possible in The Homecoming. From the Hardcover edition Something is wrong in Niceville. . . A boy literally disappears from Main Street. A security camera captures the moment of his instant, inexplicable vanishing. An audacious bank robbery goes seriously wrong: four cops are gunned down; a TV news helicopter is shot and spins crazily out of the sky, triggering a disastrous cascade of events that ricochet across twenty different lives over the course of just thirty-six hours. Nick Kavanaugh, a cop with a dark side, investigates. Soon he and his wife, Kate, a distinguished lawyer from an old Niceville family, find themselves struggling to make sense not only of the disappearance and the robbery but also of a shadow world, where time has a different rhythm and where justice is elusive. . . .Something is wrong in Niceville, where evil lives far longer than men do. Compulsively readable, and populated with characters who leap off the page, Niceville will draw you in, excite you, amaze you, horrify you, and, when it finally lets you go, make you sorry you have to leave. Read the first thirty-five pages. Find out why Harlan Coben calls Carsten Stroud the master of “the nerve-jangling thrill ride.” Now with an excerpt from Carsten Stroud’s next book, The Homecoming. In Niceville, a pleasant Southern town where evil lurks just beneath the surface, two back-to-back airplane crashes set off a spellbinding chain reaction of murder, inadvertent kidnapping, and double-dealing. Detective Nick Kavanaugh must balance his investigation into the accidents with family concerns and a long-buried mystery. He and his wife Kate, a family lawyer, have taken in Kate’s sister and her two children, escaping their abusive father Byron Deitz. The Kavanaughs are also caring for the orphaned Rainey Teague, who recently survived a strange kidnapping and has come back a very different child. Rainey was not the last person to vanish from a Niceville street; most recently, an administrator from Rainey’s school, and—even worse—Kate’s father, a local historian, have gone missing. Using her father’s files, Kate and Nick start to unearth their town’s bloodstained past, trying to discover the truth behind generations of disappearances. But a sinister someone—or something—stands in their way.