The blurb for Laura Griffin’s Vanishing Hour calls it a romantic thriller. Yes, there is romance, but the emphasis in the book is on the investigations of cold cases. And, lawyer Ava Burch, her search-and-rescue dog, Huck, and Detective Grant Wycoff make a perfect team.

It doesn’t help Ava’s credibility when she and Huck are late for their first search-and-rescue in Cuervo, Texas. She’s assigned a distant segment, but while out in the wilderness park, she spies a tent. It seems old, and she takes pictures. In the confusion after the recovery of the missing child, no one is interested in her photographs. But, Detective Wycoff from the sheriff’s department is interested. Two years earlier, a woman disappeared in that area. Now, when he and Ava return to the park, the tent is gone, but Ava has the photographic proof that it was there, and, evidence in one of pictures even points to a timeframe two years ago.

Ava and her law partner, Jenna McCollough, have the only law firm in Cuervo, and one of only three in Henley County. So, she’s busy, but something about that tent and the missing woman intrigues her enough that she keeps digging. But, she’s angry when she learns that other women have disappeared from that same area, one a year for the past three years. While Wycoff refuses to tell her what he’s working on, she continues to investigate, even going so far as to hire an investigator on her own to get information about a local business that she connects to the missing women.

Griffin does an excellent job in mixing the cold cases, the investigations, and the romance in this book. There’s the added interest of several search-and-rescue operations that involve Huck, who was just one dog trained by Laura’s late father, a game warden. Whether you’re a fan of cold cases, romantic thrillers, or mysteries involving working dogs, such as Paula Munier, Margaret Mizushima, or Jeffrey B. Burton’s series, you might enjoy Vanishing Hour.

Laura Griffin’s website is https://lauragriffin.com/

Vanishing Hour by Laura Griffin. Berkley, 2022. ISBN 9780593546697 (paperback), 336p.

FTC Full Disclosure – I read a galley for a journal.