A layover at an airport, a mysterious woman and an unforgettable kiss. This is how Layover by David Bell begins and then takes you on a suspenseful and intriguing story! I was swept away by Joshua’s story. A man who hates flying, yet it is a big part of his job. During a layover, he meets Morgan, a woman who captivates him and leave a long-lasting impressions. Imagine his surprise when he sees her on TV as a missing woman. And so, begins Joshua’s journey to find this mysterious woman who takes him down a rabbit hole!

Joshua is not a happy man. Feeling stuck, something about Morgan makes him act in way he never imagined. But Morgan has her secrets and they are ones she wants to keep close. Full of mystery and suspense, Layover by David Bell will keep you on the edge of your seat!

LOVED this book soo much!! This is the second book I've read of David's and I was not disappointed!! The main character Joshua is so easy to love!! You will find yourself telling him to just go home!! David had me turning pages so fast -- and the ending is amazing!!

Crafty, complex, and unpredictable!

Layover is a character-driven whodunit featuring the reckless and determined Joshua Fields as he throws caution to the wind and leaves his ordinary life behind to do whatever it takes to find the missing, enigmatic Morgan Reynolds who seems to have vanished into thin air after sweeping him off his feet in a bar at the Atlanta airport.

The writing is crisp and clear. The characters are impulsive, irrational, and troubled. And the plot told from two different perspectives is a menacing tale of life, love, obsession, deception, familial dynamics, desperation, violence, and murder.

I have to admit this was a really tough one for me, as even though there is no doubt that Bell can write a creative, mysterious story that some readers will absolutely love, unfortunately for me the plot was a bit too unrealistic, and the characters were a little too hard to connect to for me to enjoy Layover as much as I would have liked.

LAYOVER
David Bell
Berkley
ISBN 978-0-440-00086-0
Hardcover
Thriller

A great deal of the attraction of LAYOVER, the newly published thriller by David Bell, is that a great many readers will be able to relate to it. Oh, we would all like to be an ex-MP who wanders the country righting wrongs, or a craggy but sharp law enforcement officer in Southern California or southern Louisiana, but most of us don’t have the chops (or a prayer of acquiring them) so we live our dreams vicariously through the accounts of the fictitious lives of others. LAYOVER is just a bit different, given that it introduces a twenty-something businessman named Joshua Fields who foolishly but understandably --- and vice-versa --- follows an impulse and ultimately finds himself as a result.

LAYOVER begins after a prologue in an airport, which is understandable, given that Fields spends a lot of time in airports and on airplanes. He is logging frequent flyer miles on behalf of the real estate development company which he jointly runs with his father. It is clear almost from the beginning of LAYOVER that Fields, who is not overly fond of flying, isn’t as enamored and enthusiastic with the company as his father seems to be. Fields in the book’s present is in an Atlanta airport bar, sipping some liquid courage with a Xanax chaser as preparation for a flight to Tampa. He meets an intriguing woman who initially ignores him but then introduces herself as “Morgan.” Fields is attracted by Morgan’s appearance, but she also appears to be troubled as well. As we learn over the course of LAYOVER, Fields may be somewhat conflicted but at his core he is a very nice and caring guy, one who probably worries more about the well-being of others than he does for himself. He and Morgan share a couple of drinks while she talks and he listens. When she leaves to catch her flight to Nashville she gives him a kiss --- a deep one --- and leaves, but not before telling him that they will never see each other again. That, alas, isn’t true. Fields is barely recovering from the kiss when he sees Morgan’s picture on an airport television. It seems that she is considered a missing person. Fields impulsively blows off the meeting he is supposed to be attending in Florida and catches Morgan’s flight to Nashville. She is on the plane, all right, but nothing goes as Fields expects, either during the flight, or when they land, or when she sinks the hook a bit further into him and yanks him into a mystery in a small Kentucky town near the Tennessee border, where the head of the city’s major employer has gone missing, leaving his very angry and very dangerous brother out hunting for him and whoever caused him to vanish. There is also a very valuable ring that has vanished as well. Morgan is a former employee of the company and a number of folks on both sides of the law are looking for her. Fields is straddling the line, wondering how he got into the middle of this goat rodeo but not entirely sure how he can get himself out, or even if he wants to. There are any number of twists and turns that take place in LAYOVER before Fields decides, though whether he can follow through on what he wants may be out of his hands. You’ll have to read LAYOVER to find out.

The strength of LAYOVER isn’t the number of times it makes your heart race but rather the pitch-perfect way in which Fields is manipulated so realistically so often and so well. The male part of the audience will shake their heads quietly but knowingly while female readers will smile in the same fashion. LAYOVER is especially recommended if you’re traveling by plane this summer for business or pleasure. Keep your eyes open. You may see Joshua Fields or someone like him.

Reviewed by Joe Hartlaub
© Copyright 2019, The Book Report, Inc. All rights reserved.

This was a thriller that didn’t work for me at all. Joshua travels a lot for his work - multiple flights every week so he has his airport routines down. On a layover in Atlanta, he meets Morgan in the gift shop. They have a drink and a conversation and then she leaves for her flight. Joshua decides he can’t leave it at that - so he changes his flight to follow her.

I realized while reading this that there are a few things I need to really enjoy a thriller. I need to feel connected to the characters and invested in their wellbeing. I also need to be able to believe in the choices the characters make - even if I believe I would choose differently. I didn’t have either of those in this story. I never felt a real connection between Joshua and Morgan and didn’t understand why he would make any of the choices he made in regards to her.

Buy, borrow or skip - I would suggest skipping this one.

Thank you very much to Netgalley and the publisher for the advance review copy in exchange for my honest review.

I was not a fan of this book at all. I felt like there was too much detail and I felt like in the beginning it would jump around a lot, it would start on one thought and jump to another. This book told in two different parts, most is told from a first point of view and then some are told from a third person point of view, kind of wish they author would have stuck with one or the other. This story was completely twisted and suspenseful for sure. The book has 85 chapters which through me too since most the chapters are no more then 3-4 pages each, I felt like at some point the author kept throwing situations or different scenario just to drag the book out long, some just made no sense at all. This book was not for me at all and I didn't really like a whole like about it.

Oh David Bell, you have an amazing talent with words. From the very beginning, I was pulled in and couldn’t stop thinking about the book until I read the very last page. A man, Joshua, meets a woman, Morgan, in an airport. She has secrets, secrets that I couldn’t even imagine, and is in hiding yet she is drawn to Josh and he can’t help but follow her. This unravels an entire past that Morgan is running from and Josh is trying to wrap his brain around. With each conversation, more information is given but even more is not told. The secrets pile up, the mystery gets deeper, and the story gets better and better.

I really liked this story. It starts with an everyday meeting and goes from there. Josh was an idiot sometimes; he follows a woman he just met across the country while she just wants him to leave her alone. He blows off his job and puts his life in danger numerous times. I liked that he stood his ground to his father (his boss), that he didn’t take what Morgan said at face value, and that he asked questions even when he wasn’t sure he wanted to know the answers.

There were many ways for this story to end, as a matter of fact until the very end I was not sure which direction Josh and Morgan would go. Some will like the end, some will want a different ending but for me it was perfect.

Layover by David Bell is a must read for your summer book list! Just in time to liven up my current reads like we are introduced to Joshua. A frequent traveler he has an encounter with the unforgettable Morgan during an airport layover. What ensues is a missing persons case and Joshua finds himself on a quest to pursue Morgan at a very personal expense. I highly enjoy David Bells writing and characters. I received an ARC of this book, all opinions are my own.

I will admit to being a fickle reader these days. My life has been rather crazy at the last four months or so, more anon on that perhaps, and so my mood seems to change regularly. Sometimes I am reading serious nonfiction, sometimes literary fiction but at other times what I really need is something to entertain and distract me from the chaos seemingly surrounding me. The search for intelligent books that still manage to do this, is always going on.
It was this search which led me to Layover by David Bell. I have not read any of his previous works, but I was intrigued by the hook for Layover when I got an email from a publicist about a blog tour. What hook, you ask? Essentially, constantly traveling businessman meets beautiful stranger in an airport and decides his life is not what he wants it to be and so reckless chases after her. Trouble follows. No seriously, he ends up in a hospital trying to put his scrambled memory back together. The rest of the book is his confession of what happened.
I will confess this is not the type of thriller I typically read. If I read thrillers it is usually the espionage or international intrigue type. And Layover got off to a slow start. But once I got into I actually stayed up into the wee hours of the morning to finish it.
There are two issues/problems as I see it. One is plausibility. Many readers might question whether the seemingly sane lead character, Joshua Fields, would really make the type of asinine decisions he does. And the second, is that the secondary character, Kimberly Givens, is given a lot of time when it didn't seem to add a great deal to the story. She is a divorced single-mom trying to win a promotion, etc. But how exactly her personal life adds to the overall story I am not sure. Her detective work didn't really add an element of suspense it just was a vehicle to add details to the plot from a perspective other than Josh's.
Layover served its purpose in giving me an entertaining distraction but it wasn't good enough to make me what to seek out more of David Bell's writing. As always, your mileage may vary depending on how much you enjoy this genre, style, etc.

I love a well written strong story that makes me wonder why and how. David Bell delivers on all 9f that. It keeps you thinking and guessing. Just when I thought I had it figured out it slipped out of my fingers and had me reading and scrambling until the very end. That's the best kind of story and he delivered. And then some. Happy reading!

This is the second book by this author I have read and really like this story!!, I got into the story right away and connected with the characters!,,

Joshua meets Morgan during his Layover at the airport, and instantly wants to know her better. They grab a drink and share a kiss. After which she leaves to board her flight to Nashville telling him she won't ever she him again. At the last minute, unhappy with his current life, Joshua decides blow off his job and follow her to Nashville to see what could be. On the plane, Morgan pretends she has never met him, leaving him questioning everything until they land in Nashville and he learns she is considered a missing person. She calls him on a house phone to explain and this sets him off on a wild goose chase to find her and the reason she is running.

Layover is thrilling, shocking ride through small towns in Kentucky, diving into Morgan's past and Joshua's wants for his future. I liked Joshua's character and felt he was completely relatable. However, Morgan was very unlikable, in my opinion and I wasn't cheering for her. Suspenseful and intriguing, the ending was not resolved I'd expected it!

I received an advance copy. All opinions are honest and mine.

I really enjoyed Somebody I Used To Know and absolutely devoured this one. David just keeps getting better and better! Even my husband was intrigued - he kept asking me for updates on the story as I read it 🤣 A psychological thriller about a girl who isn’t what she truly seems. You may think it sounds typical, but it’s far from it! I was hanging on to every page. What a great ending. You’re going to want to add this to your July book list!

The idea for Layover came to author David Bell when he witnessed a chance meeting between a man and woman in the Nashville, Tennessee airport. Watching them engaged in an intense conversation, he thought they knew each other well. All of a sudden, the woman got up, took her bags, and left. The man told the bartender, "That was the strangest thing that's ever happened to me in my life. I just met that woman here in the airport. We started talking, she kissed me, and she left, saying that she's never going to see me again."

David immediately thought, "There's got to be a story behind that. There's got to be more to that. And that was the beginning of Layover," which opens with an identical chance meeting in the Atlanta, Georgia airport.

Layover is really the story of Joshua Fields, who takes the same flights every week on business. Ironically, he's afraid of flying, and can't board a plane without taking Xanax and having a drink. When he graduated from college, he had a job waiting for him with his father's company. Since then, his life has been a series of departures and arrivals, hours spent in hotels and airports. Six months ago, he and his girlfriend, Renee, broke up. But they've been talking on and off, and slept together again just a couple of weeks ago. Joshua wasn't sure that he loved Renee, and didn't have the energy to fully devote to the relationship, given the demands of his job -- a job about which he complains regularly. But since he works for his father, he has not brought himself to quit and pursue another career.

And then Joshua encounters Morgan in the Atlanta airport and is convinced that they have a connection. She claims that she is on her way to care for her terminally ill mother who is in hospice care. But she leaves suddenly, after kissing him passionately and announcing, "I'm sorry, but we're never going to see each other again." As Joshua puts it, the "desire she'd stirred was both an ache that stabbed at the center of my body and an emptiness, something I feared would never filled."

After she leaves, he looks up at the tv and is shocked to see Morgan's face. She is a missing person! So Joshua makes a reckless, irresponsible choice. He doesn't board his plane for Florida, instead deciding he must try to find and help Morgan.

Meanwhile, Kimberly Givens is a divorced mother trying to juggle the demands of raising her twelve-year-old daughter with her career as a detective. She's getting pressured by the mayor to solve the case of missing local businessman Giles Caldwell, a friend of the mayor's.

Bell takes readers on Joshua's whirlwind quest to find Morgan and learn the truth about her circumstances. Along the way, he encounters lies, deceit, manipulation, and secrets, Every time Joshua thinks he is close to solving the mystery of why Morgan was deemed missing and what she is really runny from, he reaches a dead end. And the more he searches for answers, the more suspicious his actions appear to the police who have figured out that there is a connection between both missing people -- Morgan and Giles.

Joshua's adventure is related through a first-person narrative that reveals his ambivalence about not only his job, but his relationship with Renee, and his realization that he must make changes in his life if he is ever going to be really happy. Morgan awakes feelings in him that spur him on in his quest to learn the truth. As he delivers vague excuses to his father about his absence from work, he realizes that his life cannot continue on the same trajectory. And even though he knows that chasing Morgan is crazy, he is compelled to see it through. He knows it's likely he will "strike out" and end up returning to his mundane, unfulfilling life, But he tells himself that at least he'll do so "knowing I'd done everything I could to help Morgan." Because if he just gets on the plane to Florida, he'll "always wonder. I didn't want to wonder."

Layover moves at a breakneck pace as Joshua and the police both zero in on the truth. Joshua is an empathetic character with whom any reader who has ever asked him/herself if they are missing out on something will relate. His existential wondering blossoms into a full-fledged irrational pursuit in a completely believable, credible manner. Bell makes his protagonist so relatable that readers will find themselves cheering for him as he races to learn the truth about Morgan.

Layover is an inventive, entertaining and tautly-constructed thriller. Bell has also crafted a thought-provoking story about a man who is jolted out of complacency and resignation into a grand adventure that will inspire readers to contemplate what they would do in Joshua's place. Will Joshua find Morgan? Was he correct when he sense that they shared a special connection? Will the two of them live happily together? You'll have to read Layover to find out and you are guaranteed to be thoroughly engrossed in the adventure.

Have you ever seen an attractive stranger in an airport and wondered to yourself "wow, wonder what their life is like? What if we could meet and just run away?"

Joshua Fields, a travelling salesman who hates his job but doesn't want to disappoint his Dad (owner of the business), and who fears flying (yet flies constantly) is about to find out! Sitting at a bar during a layover between flights, he is having another drink to calm his flight anxiety when a beautiful woman sits down beside him. They talk, as strangers do, at first about small things, and then things get more personal - because it's often easier to be truthful with strangers than the people we see every day, isn't it? By the time the woman gets up to leave, Joshua is completely taken with her. She kisses him, tells him her name is Morgan, and that, sadly, they will never see each other again, and walks away. Startled by her words, and having felt a real connection with her (she has made him feel alive and happy for the first time in years), he is further dismayed when he sees on TV that she is a missing person! What is she running away from? Is she in danger?! He feels he must find and help her! Soon the police are not only interested in finding Morgan, but in talking to Joshua as well. What has he gotten himself into?

I like David Bell's writing because he always gives us a good set of characters in each novel. Ones that are well-drawn, fully human, with good points and bad, he makes us understand why they act and react the way that they do. He also knows how to take the reader through the story with him, grabbing their attention and holding it by revealing deeper and deeper layers of plot and characters alike. I always look forward to reading his latest book.

All that being said, I don't think Layover is one of his best efforts. There were times I felt like screaming at Joshua ("You've been content to stay in your unfulfilling job for YEARS and now you want to run off after someone you hardly know!?! What are you thinking!?), and I would've liked to smack Morgan upside her head a few times as well, but that shows Bell had me invested in the book. Whether I think it's his best offering or not, he still had me. And isn't that what reading's all about?

Many thanks to NetGalley and Berkley for allowing me to read an ARC of Layover in exchange for an unbiased review. All opinions expressed here are my own.

Well...... I really struggled with this book and am having a hard time writing this review.

This was my first book by David Bell and unfortunately it really missed the mark for me. I have read my fair share of excellent thrillers in this genre and I have to say that I'm pretty hard to please. This... fell extremely flat for me.

I probably should have DNF this book but have heard nothing but great things about this author. The book started off ok for me and than it just was a bit of a hot mess. Joshua is a mess period. So, you meet a woman on your layover in the airport at a bar and she tells you not to follow her ever again... so what do you constantly follow her?!

NOOOOO thank you!

It was predictable and lacked suspense. I don't like writing negative reviews but I don't have much else to say that I enjoyed about this book.

2 stars for me on this one.

Thank you so much to Berkley for the arc in exchange for an honest review.

Publication date: 7/2/19
Published to GR: 6/30/19

Sandy M’s review of Layover by David Bell
Mystery/Thriller published by Berkley 2 Jul 19

It’s been quite a long while since I’ve read any mysteries or thrillers, and I chose this one because from the blurb it sounded as though there might be some romance involved. So I decided to take a chance.


And though this really isn’t a mystery or thriller with romantic elements, there’s enough tossed in that kept the romance reader in me reading to find out what happens, not only to solve the mystery but to see if Joshua and Morgan make it after all is said and done. Things look good for a while, then everything falls apart, but Joshua keeps the faith, which makes you go along with him.

Joshua works for his father, has since he graduated college, and flies all over the country for the business – and he hates flying. A drink before boarding, along with a Xanax or two, keeps his fear and panic at bay to get where he’s going. While in Atlanta, he meets up with an intriguing woman in the gift shop. They begin to talk and Joshua becomes more enamored of her, so much so he decides to reroute his flight to see if their connection is more than a momentary thing.

Morgan, it turns out, is a missing person. Thus the sunglasses and hat she took off only briefly before kissing Joshua and leaving him behind, never to see him again. So imagine her surprise when he shows up on her flight to Nashville. But Morgan is a cool cookie. She does a great act of ignoring Joshua, like she’d never met him in her life. She’s slick too. Excuses as to why she acts as she does always seem to pacify Joshua every time he comes into contact with her.

Sound like someone who’s perhaps guilty of a crime? Her boss is missing. We hear her story little by little, leading us to believe she’s innocent…then guilty…then innocent again. You are kept guessing the entire time, especially when the boss’ brother shows up and his temper flares. At times I wanted to slap Joshua up the side of the head to knock some sense into him and leave Morgan behind as she does him a time or two. But the author does a good job of making you understand his need to keep following her, to help her through whatever it is she’s going through, to see if something might work out between them.

After everything they and the reader goes through, I was hoping for a different type of ending, especially after being led in a certain direction that turns out not to be. I enjoyed Joshua’s relationship with his father, the trust they have in one another. While I was let down a bit by the end, I still liked the twists and turns on the way there, and Joshua is worth the time to sit down and read his story.

Grade: B

Layover has a great premise. Joshua Fields works with his father in real estate. He spends much of his time in airports or in the air (even though he hates to fly). During one layover he meets a beautiful and mysterious woman. They share a drink and a kiss before they part ways. Throwing caution to the wind, Joshua decides to follow her. What happens after that fateful decision is a fast-paced game of cat-and-mouse.

Layover by David Bell is the first book I’ve read by this author. While it is described as a psychological thriller, I found it to be much less so. Instead, it is a somewhat suspenseful mystery that includes a missing businessman. The story unfolds from both the perspective of Joshua and the police detective investigating the disappearance.

Layover is well-written but I found the plot to be lacking in believability and, on occasion, the pace seemed to flounder. And, even though this book was a little disappointing, I do plan to read more by Mr Bell.

Many thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for providing a copy of this book for review.

This story had so much promise, and sounded really intriguing. It was a totally fine story- the kind of book the main character, Joshua Fields, would have grabbed at an airport bookstore for a quick, easy plane read. It moved fairly quickly, but it was a little too long and meandering (and fairly predictable).

I expected Layover to be more of a high octane thriller based on the description. High octane it wasn’t. The plot felt a bit stretched and the characters a bit one dimensional.