Little Kate wants to become a detective. She is lonely and hardly communicates with anyone. The girl spends all her free time in a huge shopping center, she watches for suspicious individuals who may turn out to be criminals, and writes down her observations in a diary. She is very lonely and her only friend is a toy monkey. But one day the girl mysteriously disappears... Twenty years later, while on night duty, a shopping center security guard sees the ghostly figure of a girl with a toy monkey on the security camera monitor. Together with her friend Lisa, they walk through a deserted shopping center, trying to uncover the secrets of the distant past.

Before becoming a writer, Catherine O'Flynn changed many occupations: she worked as a postman, a salesman in a music store, a teacher, and an editor for online publications. O’Flynn’s debut novel “What’s Missing” brought resounding success. She has been nominated for several significant literary awards, won the prestigious Costa Books prize and was named Best Newcomer in English Literature 2008.