I Will Find You

I Will Find You (2023) is Harlan Coben’s 36th suspense thriller, which follows the wrongly convicted David Burroughs as he seeks his missing—allegedly murdered—son. Coben is a bestselling author who won Edgar, Shamus, and Anthony Awards for his Myron Bolitar mystery series, and several of his books have been adapted for Netflix and Amazon Prime. Other works by Coben include Tell No One (2001), Fool Me Once (2016), and The Boy From the Woods (2020).

This guide is based on the Hachette Book Group e-book version.

Content Warning: This guide mentions child abuse, death by suicide, and sexual assault.

Plot Summary

David Burroughs is wrongly imprisoned for the murder of his three-year-old son Matthew. Five years into a life sentence, his former sister-in-law Rachel Anderson comes to see him, with a photograph taken by a friend at Six Flags. In the photograph, David recognizes Matthew, alive and five years older. Realizing the battered boy’s body found in Matthew’s bedroom wasn’t his son, he plans to get out of prison and find him. The prison warden is Philip Mackenzie, David’s godfather. Philip believes David committed the murder in a fugue state, and that his claim of Matthew being alive is a delusion. He is troubled nevertheless and goes to see David’s father Lenny. Lenny is dying of cancer and only responds to Phillip with a single tear. Philip realizes he has to do something to help David.

While Philip is away from the prison, one of the other prisoners, Ross Sumner, tries to kill David. He fails but bribes one of the guards, Curly, to kill David. This attempt fails, but when Philip returns, he realizes David isn’t safe at the prison. He and his son Adam, David’s best friend, arrange for David to get out, pretending he somehow took Philip’s gun and forced Philip to drive him out of the prison. After a hectic pursuit, David escapes.

David rendezvouses with Rachel, and they set out to find Matthew. Their first stop is Hilde Winslow, a former neighbor who lied on the witness stand, claiming she saw David burying the murder weapon. After the trial, Hilde moved and changed her name. She confesses to David that she was forced to lie by a man with a white streak in his hair, who threatened to hurt her family. He recognizes the man with the white streak as “Skunk Kyle,” an enforcer for the Fisher family crime syndicate in his childhood neighborhood in Boston.

Returning to this neighborhood, David arranges a meeting with Skunk Kyle. Instead, he is ambushed and taken to Nicky Fisher—the retired head of the Fisher family crime syndicate—in Florida. Nicky tells him a story about his father Lenny, when he was still a police officer: Lenny had planted evidence to get Nicky’s son Mikey convicted of murder. Nicky stole the evidence and paid off police, prosecutors, and judges. He reveals that when police searched David’s house, they found his murder weapon, but Lenny again used his influence to suppress the discovery. Nicky considers child murder the worst crime possible and thus forced Hilde to lie on the stand. Now, Nicky contemplates killing David slowly. David convinces him that he didn’t kill Matthew, and is let go.

Meanwhile, Rachel talks to an old friend, Hayden Payne, who has always been infatuated with her. Hayden once saved her from a near-assault by almost beating the assailant to death. Then, Hayden’s wealthy, influential family covered up the incident. The family owns the company that hosted an event at the Six Flags where Matthew’s photograph was taken. They also own a fertility clinic where David’s ex-wife Cheryl Dreason inquired about fertility treatment behind his back. Hayden promises to help Rachel by giving her photographs taken at the event.

Hayden returns home to his son Theo—who is actually Matthew. When Cheryl went to the fertility clinic, she used Rachel’s name. Believing Rachel was seeking to get pregnant, Hayden arranged for his own sperm to be used—thinking a child would link him to Rachel. When he found out Cheryl was the mother, he arranged to “rescue” his son. Afterward, he wondered if he made a mistake. Hayden’s grandmother and matriarch of the family, Gertrude “Pixie” Payne, knows returning Matthew would ruin the family’s reputation, so she had DNA tests done and lied to Hayden about Theo being his son.

David returns from Florida, and he and Rachel look through Hayden’s provided photographs. They don’t find any more photographs of Matthew, so they go to the home of Rachel’s friends, who took the original photograph. David breaks into their house and reluctantly threatens them until they show him the original photograph. Rachel recognizes the class ring on the hand that rests on Matthew’s shoulder as Hayden’s. With police closing in, David and Rachel go to the Payne estate. David hides among trees while Rachel gets Hayden to admit to his crime. David comes out of hiding and threatens Hayden, who runs to Matthew/Theo’s room. Pixie arrives, and Hayden wants to reveal everything to the police. She reveals Theo’s true paternity and tells Hayden to leave with him before the police arrive. Matthew refuses to leave, as he has recognized David as his father. At that moment, the police break in and shoot David.

David survives, recovers, and is eventually exonerated. Hayden and Pixie escape justice by paying off prosecutors and judges. When Nicky hears about their kidnapping, he decides to retaliate; David never finds out what Nicky did to them. David and Rachel fall in love, and he shares custody of Matthew, who is happy to be back with his true family.