L.A. homicide detective Peter Decker and Rina Lazarus, his Orthodox Jewish wife, return in a new entry in this popular series. Faye Kellerman can be counted on to deliver emotional complexity along with suspense, and in The Forgotten it comes from the relationship between Peter and Jacob, Rina's troubled teenage son. Jacob has a personal connection to the event that sets off this intricately plotted novel, the defacing of Rina's synagogue by one of his classmates. Ernesto Golding can't explain why he vandalized the synagogue, but when he and his therapists are murdered months after the incident, Peter realizes that something the teenager told him when admitting his guilt may hold the key to the killings: Ernesto's belief that his grandfather may have been a Nazi who posed as a Jew to escape to South America after the war. Investigating Ernesto's story gives Rina a strand of the plot to tease out; meanwhile, Peter concentrates on another motive for the therapist murders that involves computer fraud, the College Board exams, and the high cost exacted by parents who pressure their teenagers to succeed.

Kellerman skillfully keeps the dramatic tension going as she pulls all the pieces of her complex plot together. But what makes this novel her best yet is her acutely revealing portrait of Jacob, struggling with the existential angst of adolescence as he attempts to reconcile his devotion to Judaism with the temptations of contemporary life, from drugs to sex. She brilliantly limns his search for identity, intimacy, and independence even as he redefines his relationship to Peter and Rina, in a scenario that resounds with psychological truth. The Forgotten is a terrific addition to the Kellerman oeuvre. While she's always been an exceptional illustrator of the emotional life of the family, this time she writes with an expertise that may owe something to professional insights of her husband, author Jonathan Kellerman, who's also a child psychologist. --Jane Adams


From Publishers Weekly
In this complex, disturbing novel (after 2000's Stalker), Kellerman again adroitly balances Rina Lazarus's consuming Orthodox Judaism with the broader societal issues faced by her husband, L.A. homicide detective Peter Decker. Here they intertwine when the vicious defacement of their synagogue reverberates in a widening circle of murders. Ernesto Golding, a troubled, spoiled youth and acquaintance of Rina's son, Jacob, confesses to the crime, but several months later Ernesto and his therapists, Mervin and Dee Baldwin, are murdered. Ernesto had discovered that his beloved grandfather may have been a Nazi who escaped Germany disguised as a Jew. While Rina delves into this provocative strand of the plot, Peter and his staff investigate hate groups. Then another killing ties the therapists to not only the hate groups but also an insidious current of psychological and sexual manipulation and computer fraud. Kellerman focuses on the plight of desperate young people misused and misunderstood by their parents, who apply unbearable pressures for success on their often- bewildered children. She also shows the deepening love and rapport between Decker and his stepson as Jacob helps solve the case. Although the Holocaust subplot seems forced to give Rina a larger role, the author, as usual, seamlessly weaves her themes of religious belief and familial respect into a multilayered thriller, with finely realized characters and a tangible sense of place. 250,000 first printing. Copyright 2001 Cahners Business Information, Inc.


From Library Journal
Peter Decker and Rina Lazarus are back, investigating evidence of a hate crime at the local synagogue. But when the teenaged culprit and his two therapists are found murdered, our intrepid team realizes that there's much more afoot. Copyright 2001 Reed Business Information, Inc.


From AudioFile
When the synagogue of LAPD Lt. Peter Decker and wife Rina Lazarus is vandalized, Decker's investigation and Lazarus's research uncover white supremacists, family secrets, murder, and therapists who exploit the alienated children of the wealthy. Dennis Boutsikaris fails to do justice to Kellerman's newest Decker/Lazarus book. He repeatedly mispronounces Hebrew and Yiddish works intrinsic to the Jewish setting. His narrative voice is adequate, but his characterizations are uneven at best. His accents strain credulity. Nevertheless, the story is absorbing and suspenseful, with a full cast of intriguing characters and a dramatic resolution. The culture of disaffected teens in the affluent neighborhoods of Los Angeles provides a perfect setting. Decker's complex relationship with his troubled stepson is woven seamlessly into the plot with moving results. A good read deserves a better reader. E.S. © AudioFile2002, Portland, Maine-- Copyright © AudioFile, Portland, Maine


From Booklist
Detective Peter Decker's teenage stepson, Jacob, plays a prominent role in Kellerman's latest Decker/Lazarus thriller. When Decker is called in to investigate the desecration of the shul that he and his Orthodox Jewish family attend, he learns that Jacob knows one of the people responsible--17-year-old Ernesto Golding, who, like Jacob, has kept some unpleasant company and dabbled in drugs. Later, when troubled Ernesto is brutally murdered, Decker turns to Jacob for help, only to discover more disturbing secrets about his stepson. Hate groups and disaffected teens are but two of the dramatic elements Kellerman works into the exciting, well-paced story, but perhaps what she does best is speak to faith and family. Her ending is over the top, and strong-willed Rina's role in the story is disappointingly small, but the depiction of how teens and parents push and pull at one another's emotions is dead on. Readers new to the series will want to get earlier books to catch up on the family dynamics. Stephanie Zvirin
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved


Book Description

Rina Lazarus and her husband, LAPD Homicide Lieutenant Peter Decker, are shocked by an outrage that cuts close to the spiritual heart of their family. Rina's small storefront synagogue has been desecrated with anti-Semitic graffiti and grisly Nazi death camp photographs. The alleged perpetrator is seventeen-year-old Ernesto Golding, a "rich kid" obsessed with haunting suspicions about the origins of his Polish paternal grandfather. Then Ernesto is found brutally murdered, along with his therapist, Dr. Mervin Baldwin, at an exclusive nature camp that caters moneyed, troubled children. For Decker and his wife, unraveling the truth behind Ernesto's violent death becomes more terrifying with each sinister twist. For lethal secrets with roots in the horrors of a past genteration are coming to the surface, propelling Peter and Rina into a ghastly world of ruthless parents and damaged youth -- and toward a dark evil and its ultimate retribution.


About the Author
Faye Kellerman introduced L.A. cop Peter Decker and his wife, Rina Lazarus, to the mystery world in 1983. Since then she has published 13 Decker/Lazarus novels, the most recent being the New York Times bestseller The Forgotten. She is also the author of Moon Music, a contemporary thriller set in Las Vegas, and The Quality of Mercy, a historical novel of Elizabethan England. Kellerman lives in California with her husband, noted author Jonathan Kellerman, and their four children, three dogs, and fish too numerous to count.

FROM OUR EDITORS

When you're the wife of a cop, all it takes is a single phone call from the police to send your heart reeling. But after learning that her husband and children are safe, Rina Lazarus's fright turns to fury. Someone has viciously vandalized the storefront temple where Rina and her family worship. And though years of living with religious intolerance should have steeled her, Rina quickly summons her husband, Detective Lieutenant Peter Decker, to find and arrest the culprit.

Not surprisingly, it's just a boy who claims responsibility for the crime. But something about the confession of Ernesto Golding, the 17-year-old scion of wealthy parents, and the easy sentencing of community service and counseling that he receives, leaves Decker troubled. How could a single young man wreak such total destruction on his own? And if he wasn't alone, then who acted with him or encouraged him to commit such a senseless crime?

It isn't long before Decker has more to worry about than another troubled teen spiraling out of control. Only weeks after entering counseling, Ernesto and his therapists are brutally murdered. And their deaths are only the beginning.

Now what seemed like and open-and-shut case has turned far deadlier that anyone could have imagined. And as the body count mounts, Peter Decker and Rina Lazarus find themselves thrust into the world of the nouveau riche, where hate and greed lie just beneath the surface of a glittering facade, twisted minds admire winning above all else, and a child's academic success is the ultimate status symbol.

Because in a world as perverted as this, the desire to be the best has driven otherwise good parents to do very bad things, leaving them and their families at the mercy of a killer who has his own reasons for needing to succeed. Few can resist the lure of his attractively disguised promise. None can hide from his psychopathic reach. And this time, not even Decker's own stepson will emerge unscarred from the search for a killer.

ANNOTATION

Slowly, lethal secrets with roots in the horrors of a past generation surface, propelling Peter and Rina into a dreaded journey of dark and evil ￯﾿ﾽ and of ultimate retribution.

FROM THE PUBLISHER

"The unofficial caretaker of her small store-front synagogue, Rina is shocked when she receives a morning call from the police. The modest place of worship has been desecrated with anti-Semitic graffiti and grisly Nazi death-camp photographs. Rina's husband, Lt. Peter Decker, is also rocked by this outrage, which cuts close to the spiritual heart of his family, but he can't let his emotions get in the way of his duties." "A suspect is soon in custody. Seventeen-year-old Ernesto Golding is one of L.A's children of wealth and privilege, a rich kid obsessed with haunting suspicions about the origins of his Polish paternal grandfather, who moved to Argentina after the Third Reich collapsed. Charges are brought against Ernesto, a deal is cut, and the vandalism case is eventually closed." "Still, Decker has never abandoned the possibility that others were involved in the desecration. And his hunch is confirmed when, six months later, Ernesto is found brutally murdered along with his therapist, Dr. Mervin Baldwin, at the psychologist's exclusive nature camp that caters to the wealthy's troubled children. Suspicion falls immediately on Baldwin's psychologist wife, Dee, who has vanished mysteriously. Further probing by Decker fails to produce quick answers and simple solutions." For Decker and Rina, unraveling the truth behind Ernesto's violent death becomes more terrifying with each sinister twist, pushing them into the ghastly world of ruthless parents and damaged youths. Slowly, lethal secrets with roots in the horrors of a past generation surface, propelling Peter and Rina into a dreaded journey of dark and evil - and of ultimate retribution.

FROM THE CRITICS

Publishers Weekly

In this complex, disturbing novel (after 2000's Stalker), Kellerman again adroitly balances Rina Lazarus's consuming Orthodox Judaism with the broader societal issues faced by her husband, L.A. homicide detective Peter Decker. Here they intertwine when the vicious defacement of their synagogue reverberates in a widening circle of murders. Ernesto Golding, a troubled, spoiled youth and acquaintance of Rina's son, Jacob, confesses to the crime, but several months later Ernesto and his therapists, Mervin and Dee Baldwin, are murdered. Ernesto had discovered that his beloved grandfather may have been a Nazi who escaped Germany disguised as a Jew. While Rina delves into this provocative strand of the plot, Peter and his staff investigate hate groups. Then another killing ties the therapists to not only the hate groups but also an insidious current of psychological and sexual manipulation and computer fraud. Kellerman focuses on the plight of desperate young people misused and misunderstood by their parents, who apply unbearable pressures for success on their often- bewildered children. She also shows the deepening love and rapport between Decker and his stepson as Jacob helps solve the case. Although the Holocaust subplot seems forced to give Rina a larger role, the author, as usual, seamlessly weaves her themes of religious belief and familial respect into a multilayered thriller, with finely realized characters and a tangible sense of place. Copyright 1999 Cahners Business Information.

Library Journal

Kellerman's latest addition to her popular series is another gripping police procedural and engaging family drama. When the synagogue his family attends is viciously defaced, L.A. homicide detective Peter Decker becomes personally involved. With Peter's help, Ernesto Golding, a 17-year-old acquaintance of Peter's stepson, Jacob, confesses. Recently coming to believe that his grandfather, always a somewhat secretive man, was a Nazi who merely posed as a Jew to escape Europe, Ernesto seemed to be expressing his anger and confusion through vandalism. When Ernesto is found murdered along with his therapist at an exclusive camp catering to the disturbed children of the very wealthy, Peter's personal interest becomes professional. While Simon and Schuster's production is well abridged and features an outstanding narration by Dennis Boutsikaris, the unabridged edition read by Barrett Whitener contains all the details series fans will crave. Either version would be a solid addition to mystery collections; choosing between them will depend on budget and patron preference. Beth Farrell, Portage Cty. Dist. Lib., OH Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information.

AudioFile

When the synagogue of LAPD Lt. Peter Decker and wife Rina Lazarus is vandalized, Decker's investigation and Lazarus's research uncover white supremacists, family secrets, murder, and therapists who exploit the alienated children of the wealthy. Dennis Boutsikaris fails to do justice to Kellerman's newest Decker/Lazarus book. He repeatedly mispronounces Hebrew and Yiddish works intrinsic to the Jewish setting. His narrative voice is adequate, but his characterizations are uneven at best. His accents strain credulity. Nevertheless, the story is absorbing and suspenseful, with a full cast of intriguing characters and a dramatic resolution. The culture of disaffected teens in the affluent neighborhoods of Los Angeles provides a perfect setting. Decker's complex relationship with his troubled stepson is woven seamlessly into the plot with moving results. A good read deserves a better reader. E.S. (c) AudioFile 2002, Portland, Maine

Kirkus Reviews