Missing

This remarkable book defies simple classification. Although ostensibly a study of missing persons (both from the perspective of the missing and those left behind), it is also an autobiography, an investigative report and a memoir of the effect of a story on the reporter who covers it. O'Hagan, a Scot of Irish ancestry, grew up in a ""New Town"" housing development near Glasgow. His childhood memories, which make up much of the first third of the book, are rich in stories of people who disappeared: a grandfather lost at sea, legends of Bible John (something of a Glasgow Jack-the-Ripper, who was never found), a neighborhood child about his own age who (perhaps) was lured into a van and never seen again and, the same year, a local young mother and her child who mysteriously dropped out of sight. O'Hagan's memoirs are noteworthy for their unromanticized treatment of children's cruelty toward each other. The second third of the book consists of interviews with parents of missing children, with a London missing persons police officer, with a coroner, with special workers concerned with runaways and with runaways who don't want to be found. The book ends with a long firsthand investigation of a Gloucester serial killer who buried his victims in his backyard. Quibbles could be made about the book's balance, as some sections are allotted more space than they need. A new introduction in which a Baltimore kidnapping is examined briefly has been added for this American edition. It would be unfortunate if the book's highly British ambiance keeps this insightful and personally affecting study from an American audience. (Nov.)