COBEN excels in thrillers set in suburban America where domestic life is turned on its head and everyday families inadvertently step into deadly danger.

So a story built around a former missile base, spy-era secrets and a decades-long conspiracy seems like a worrying break from tradition for this page-turning author.

But of course nothing is what it seems, and in this gripping novel Coben is still interested in the tiny details of small-town life and the reasons normal people turn bad.

As usual the setting is New Jersey, a world Coben knows intimately, in a town where years ago a teenage boy and girl were found dead.

Most people think the pair killed themselves, but a small group of their friends know what really happened – and at least one of them may even have been there.

Following a new murder, the dead boy’s cop brother sets out to discover what really happened.

Secrets pile upon secrets, and it turns out those who think they know what happened, actually don’t.

Don’t Let Go shares similar story elements to previous Coben novels – as many of them do -- but there are plenty of twists to keep readers satisfied all the way to the end.

One of his best novels in recent years.

David Knights