Book ~ "No Safe House" (2014) Linwood Barclay

From Goodreads ~ Seven years ago, Terry Archer and his family experienced a horrific ordeal that nearly cost them their lives. Today, the echoes of that fateful night are still audible. Terry’s wife, Cynthia, is living separate from her husband and daughter after her own personal demons threatened to ruin her relationship with them permanently. Their daughter, Grace, is rebelling against her parents’ seemingly needless overprotection. Terry is just trying to keep his family together. And the entire town is reeling from the senseless murder of two elderly locals.

But when Grace foolishly follows her delinquent boyfriend into a strange house, the Archers must do more than stay together. They must stay alive. Because now they have all been unwillingly drawn into the shadowy depths of their seemingly idyllic hometown.

For there, they will be reconnected with the man who saved their lives seven years ago, but who still remains a ruthless, unrepentant criminal. They will encounter killers for hire working all sides. And they will learn that there are some things people value much more than money, and will do anything to get it.

Caught in a labyrinth between family loyalty and ultimate betrayal, Terry must find a way to extricate his family from a lethal situation he still doesn’t fully comprehend. All he knows is that to live, he may have to do the unthinkable.

There is a lot of tension in the Archer family.  Cynthia's past causes her to be overprotective of her fourteen-year-old daughter, Grace.  Grace, in turn, pushes back.  Terry tries to be the peacekeeper between his wife and daughter.  It comes to the point where Cynthia feels she has to step away from the situation and moves out for a while.

One night, Grace and her boyfriend, Stuart, break into a house with the intent to "borrow" the car keys and take the car for a ride.  But all doesn't go as planned.  Terry tries to protect Grace, which draws in Vince, a criminal from their past who is somehow involved in it.

This is the 12th book I've read by this author.  I've enjoyed many of his books while I found others just okay.  I hate to say it but I didn't enjoy this one. 

It is the sequel to No Time for Goodbye, which I read (and enjoyed) in 2008.  I don't think the author did a good job tying it in with the earlier book. He'd drop tidbits of info from the first book to catch you up but I didn't find it was enough ... it has been eight years since I've read the first one so I couldn't remember what had happened.  He would have been better off not making it a sequel and using the same story but with new fresh characters. 

It is written in first (in Terry's voice) and third person perspective.  As a head's up, there is swearing.  It's a big book (almost 500 pages).  The writing could have been tighter so it wouldn't have seemed so draggy.  Also, it seemed like the author was trying too hard to establish the suspense ... nameless people have conversations, etc.

I found I couldn't get into the characters.  I didn't find them likeable and couldn't muster up any sympathy or compassion for them.