Great family drama

Any additional comments?

I enjoyed this book. It starts with a key event - Peter in hospital witnessing the death of his son. This has the advantage of getting straight to the story (which I like) but it does mean I didn't really care much that David died (because I didn't know him or Peter). This made the story a bit clinical, but over time it developed into a family drama. I wouldn't call it a thriller although it does fall into that style for the last couple of hours. In my opinion this spoils the last part of the book - hence four stars not five, because it falls into cliché.

The story follows Peter and his grief, which leads him to a support group and there he makes a friend whose child is missing (kidnapped). In dealing with his own grief Peter explores ways to help his friend, Roger.

There are only a few key characters in the entire story and we follow the story chronologically (apart from some brief reminiscences) which made it ideally suited for audio. It is gripping, in that I wanted to know what happened, but I felt it was more subtle than a thriller -until the last couple of hours which are predictably 'let's chase the bad guy ourselves without the police and hope readers don't realise how silly that is'.

The narration was good, clear and precise. I felt it was too clinical initially as it didn't help me get to know Peter, but it also suited his detached professionalism (Peter is a doctor). The narrator didn't do any voices which I personally like however this didn't work well for one character-Graham -who is a 6 year old child because he spoke like an adult. Apart from that, it was good listen and I would try something by this author and narrator in future.

I recommend this book. Finally I should say I received a free copy of this book from Audioblast in exchange for an honest review.

You voted on this review!

You reported this review!

1 person found this helpful