I Will Find You and Kansas City Chiefs
I Will Find You By: Harlan Coben
Published: March 14, 2023 Date Finished: January 10, 2024
Rating: 7/10
I first discovered Harlan Coben about a decade ago in the library stacks. He made his name writing a thriller series staring a former Duke University basketball standout turned sports agent Myron Bolitar. I’m a fan of the Blue Devils and was considering a career path as a sports agent at the time, so I naturally picked up the first book in the series Deal Breaker. I’ve read just about every book Coben has published since then.
I Will Find You starts by introducing us to David Burroughs, an inmate at maximum security Briggs Penitentiary where he is serving a life sentence for the murder of his son Matthew five years prior. David is wasting away in the isolation wing of the prison after suffering a severe beating while in the general population. Despite knowing he didn’t commit the crime; he is despondent because he failed to protect his son from violence and doesn’t see the point in continuing trying to live a productive life.
David hasn’t talked to anyone since being incarcerated and has refused visitors, but he is forced to meet with his former sister-in-law Rachel. Rachel is battling her own demons after a scandal forced her out of her dream job as an investigative journalist. Rachel shows David a photo of a friend and her family at an amusement park. In the background is a boy of about 8 years old with a distinctive birth mark that they believe, possibly, against all odds, might be, Matthew.
David is attacked in prison and resolves that he must get out and find his son. He is aided by the prison warden (who happens to be David’s Godfather) and manages to get out and start his search for his son. As he hunts down lose ends the FBI are on his tail. If Matthew is still alive, those responsible for his kidnapping must also be monitoring David’s progress as well. With many twist and turns, I Will Find You keeps the reader on the edge of their seat for 300+ pages.
Coben has a distinct writing style that really gets you right to the point of the issue. In my opinion, there’s no one writing thrillers right now that can keep a reader turning the pages like Coben. However, a reader often has to suspend their disbelief as some of the coincidences and choices by the characters stretch credulity regularly.
For me, after a 1000 page experimental novel in Ducks, Newburyport, I Will Find You was a good palate cleanser as I start to get into more “literary” works of the 2023 short list of the Booker Prize in my upcoming books.
Kansas City Chiefs (vs Miami Dolphins) -4.5 -110 at Draftkings
YTD 1-1-0 and -0.05 units
The Chiefs with Patrick Mahomes have proven they can win playoff games in the cold at Arrowhead Stadium. There is proof of concept there. Andy Reid, Mahomes, Travis Kelce and the rest of that offense have earned the benefit of the doubt that they will show up and perform well on Saturday despite an unusually pedestrian regular season by their standards. (As a Bears fan, I do worry Offensive Coordinator and former Bears Head Coach Matt Nagy is so bad that he can drag down even a transcendent talent like Mahomes).
Something I haven’t seen is Tua Tagovailoa in a playoff game. I also haven’t seen the native Hawaiian that went to college at Alabama before being drafted by Miami play in cold weather all that often. It will be cold in Kansas City this weekend and I think that plays right into the Chiefs hands. The weather may provide even more of a home field advantage than the 75,000 or so red clad fans screaming every time the fins take the field.
Miami will be missing star pass rusher Bradley Chubb after he tore his ACL at the end of the regular season. The injury report overall seems to favor the Chiefs and, in the NFL, often the most important ability is availability.
It’s a shame this game will only be streaming on Peacock, but it shapes up to be one of the most compelling wild card games since the playoff field expanded a couple years ago. The Chiefs have been buoyed by a surprisingly stout defense this season and they’ll need to show up big time against a Dolphins offense that has shown it can score at will. At the end of the day though, I’ll take the team that I’ve seen do it before. Chiefs to win by a touchdown, book it!