Finding Sophie: A heartfelt, page turning thriller that shows how far parents will go for their child

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'A heart stopping thriller, a heartfelt mystery' CHRIS WHITAKER
'A clever, chilling thriller that is also unexpectedly moving' SHARI LAPENA
'Kept me guessing until the very end' IAN RANKIN
'Incredible plotting and devastatingly good writing' THE SECRET BARRISTER

Sophie King is missing.

Her parents, Harry and Zara, are distraught; for the last seventeen years, they've done everything for their beloved only daughter and now she's gone.

The police have no leads, and Harry and Zara are growing increasingly frantic, although they are both dealing with it in very different ways. Increasingly obsessed with their highly suspicious neighbour who won't open the door or answer any questions, they are both coming to the same conclusion. If they want answers, they're going to have to take matters into their own hands.

But just how far are they prepared to go for the love of their daughter

'Powerfully and brilliantly written' VASEEM KHAN
'Pure brilliance' JANICE HALLETT
'Wow, what an ending!' C. L. TAYLOR
'An astonishingly twisty tale of despair, deception and desperation' LIZ NUGENT

An Observer thriller of the month.

Reviews

Kept me guessing until the very end. A courtroom drama with nice sharp teeth -- Ian Rankin
Incredible plotting and devastatingly good writing this book deserves enormous success -- The Secret Barrister
Finding Sophie is a great thriller as well as a moving look at parental grief . . . I frequently wept while reading it but couldn't put it down -- Alison Flood, Observer
[A] forceful slow-burn narrative . . . handled with Grisham-like assurance * Financial Times *
A moving yet tense read with a jaw-dropping end * Woman's Own *
I couldn't turn the pages fast enough * Nina Pottell, Prima *
Nuanced, heart-breaking . . . absorbing and genuinely moving not to be missed * Daily Mail *
I loved it, so smart and the plot twists blew me away. Imran is the only author writing about a missing person that deals with grief this well -- Gillian McAllister
The suspense is well maintained throughout . . . surprising and satisfying . . . it is a treat to read accounts of a police investigation and court case written by someone who knows how both are conducted * Literary Review *
A clever, chilling thriller that is also unexpectedly moving -- Shari Lapena
Finding Sophie is a rare accomplishment. By turns a heart-stopping thriller, a heartfelt mystery, and a powerful study of grief, hope, and the unbreakable bond between parent and child. Brilliant -- Chris Whitaker, author of We Begin at the End
Compelling * Crime Monthly *
Wow, what an ending! An intense, desperate, heartfelt and claustrophobic story about the lengths parents will go to for love. Some books have a gut punch at the end. In Finding Sophie you're emotionally winded all the way through -- C. L. Taylor
This thrilling and emotional roller coaster moved me to tears with its powerful portrayal of the agonies of parental love and loss. Perfect for fans of Lisa Jewell, Imran Mahmood has excelled himself with this clever, heart-breaking thriller -- Jo Callaghan, author of In the Blink of an Eye
What an exciting and compulsive read! Two parents with the same goal afraid to tell each other how far they are prepared to go, but they are not the only ones keeping secrets. Imran has surpassed my expectations with an astonishingly twisty tale of despair, deception and desperation -- Liz Nugent, author of Strange Sally Diamond
Finding Sophie is a Domestic Noir objet d'art. Mahmood's writing is exceptionally beautiful for a crime genre novel. The tension he manages to weave within such accessible and recognisable human emotions is genuinely extraordinary, and the pacing hits a real punch because you spend the entire book just wanted it all to turn out all right. Brilliant bated-breath stuff -- Helen Fields, author of The Institution
Finding Sophie by Imran Mahmood is his best yet. Beautifully written, visceral, evocative, and compelling but with a plot that keeps you guessing to the end. So much more than a legal thriller, this is a work of pure brilliance -- Janice Hallett
Mahmood's latest slice of psychological noir examines the dilemma facing a couple whose child has gone missing and who are convinced the culprit lives on their own street. How far will desperate parents go What boundaries will they cross to uncover the fate of their child These are the questions tackled by Mahmood in this powerful and beautifully written suspense thriller -- Vaseem Khan
One of the best and most intelligent thrillers I've read in a long while. Written with such skill that you forget you're reading a novel and just get lost in the story. Gripping, moving, brilliant -- Anna Mazzola
Another startlingly original story from one of the UK's finest crime writers. When it comes to legal thrillers with unreliable narrators. Imran Mahmood is pretty much peerless. Unputdownable -- M. W. Craven
It is heart-stopppingly good, both as a thriller (that final third had me glued to the pages as [Mahmood] delivered twists like sucker punches) and as a study in family life and parental love. Both Harry and Zara were superbly drawn and the resolution was so satisfying, exactly what this reader needed -- Sarah Hilary
An absolutely wonderful book. Imran is the absolute master of misdirection, as I've learned from his earlier novels, but with Finding Sophie he digs deep into the psychology of grief and loss too. Harry and Zara are such exceptionally drawn characters, their slow unravelling in the wake of Sophie's disappearance charted with deep skill. The story is both outrageous and utterly believable, the twist in its tail a masterstroke. I enjoyed it immensely, and indeed devoured the second half of it in one long sitting -- James Oswald
Balancing deeply-drawn parental heartbreak and incomprehension to the extent of obsession, as the couple go to all extremes to resolve the often rebellious Sophie's absence, the novel treads an assured suspenseful itinerary that never lets go and compels the reader to keep turning the pages. Not far from a perfect read -- Crime Time, Maxim Jakubowski

Author Bio

Imran Mahmood is a practicing barrister with thirty years' experience fighting cases in courtrooms across the country. His previous novels have been highly critically acclaimed: You Don't Know Me was a BBC Radio 2 Book Club choice, Goldsboro Book of the Month and was shortlisted for the Glass Bell Award; both this and I Know What I Saw were longlisted for the Theakston Old Peculier Crime Novel of the Year and the CWA Gold Dagger. You Don't Know Me was also made into a hugely successful BBC1 adaptation in association with Netflix. His third novel, All I Said Was True was also longlisted for the Theakston Old Peculier Crime Novel of the Year.

When not in court or writing novels or screenplays he can sometimes be found on the Red Hot Chilli Writers' podcast as one of their regular contributors. He hails from Liverpool but now lives in London with his wife and daughters.

@imranmahmood777