When a young girl is snatched from a West Yorkshire town there are eerie similarities with a cold case from many years earlier. It can't be the same killer, can it?

Yorkshire, 1994. Eighteen-year-old Adrian Brown spends his days working at the local newspaper, and his evenings in his local pub. But under this ordinary surface lies a haunting story. Aged ten, Adrian was kidnapped by a shadowy figure known as The Lollipop Man, who had abducted three children before. Adrian was the only one to escape.

The Lollipop Man might well have returned when another missing child whips up a media frenzy. Journalist Sheila Hargreaves, troubled with memories of her own involvement in the reporting of the previous abductions, is determined to dig deeper, atone for what she did nearly a decade ago and bring the Lollipop Man to justice.