It's every parent's worst nightmare...

Stephanie Harker is travelling through the security gates at O'Hare airport, on her way to an idyllic holiday. Five-year-old Jimmy goes through the metal detector ahead of her. But then, in panic and disbelief, Stephanie watches as a uniformed agent leads her boy away - and she's stuck the other side of Security, hysterical with worry.

The authorities, unaware of Jimmy's existence, just see a woman behaving erratically; Stephanie is brutally wrestled to the ground and blasted with a taser gun to restrain her. And by the time she can tell them what has happened, Jimmy is long gone.

But as Stephanie tells her story to the FBI, it becomes clear that everything is not as it seems with this seeminglynormal family. What is Jimmy's background? Why would someone want to abduct him? And, with time running out, how can Stephanie get him back?

A breathtakingly rich and gripping psychological thriller, The Vanishing Point is Val McDermid's most accomplished standalone novel to date, a work of haunting brilliance.