Editorial Content for Caller Unknown
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Reviewer (text)
In Gillian McAllister’s thrillers, her characters are often pushed to the limit and have to make startling and unexpected choices. That is definitely the case in her latest release, CALLER UNKNOWN, which illustrates the lengths to which a mother will go to save her only daughter.
At the start of the novel, Simone thinks to herself, Your children are only ever on loan to you. This is an eerie foreshadowing of what’s to come when she and her daughter, Lucy, head to the Texas desert to spend some quality time together before Lucy heads off to college. After an uneventful first night at their cabin, Simone wakes up and notices a knot of hair that looks like Lucy’s sticking to their broken front door. Further inspection shows that the teen is not just out for a stroll. She may be missing.
"[W]e see the extreme lengths to which a mother will go to save her child regardless of the cost. CALLER UNKNOWN definitely goes there, and McAllister has plenty of surprises to unleash before everything is wrapped up."
The only evidence is a call that Simone receives from an unknown number. The voice on the other line warns her not to contact the authorities and gives her information about a location where they will meet up and be prepared to do a deal. Simone notifies her husband, Damien, who immediately jumps on a plane and pleads with her to call the police. She does not follow his advice for fear of Lucy being taken from her forever.
What could have been a standard abduction and ransom saga takes several unexpected turns in McAllister’s hands. The result is a thriller that can never be labeled as predictable. Simone follows the directions of the kidnapper, and after a perfunctory first meeting goes well, she is given a second assignment that is far more dangerous. It will involve her crossing the southern border into Mexico, which Damien is completely against.
The events in Mexico kick off a series of reckless decisions that are spearheaded by Simone’s realization that her daughter is not being kept for money or any sort of drug exchange. Lucy is being held captive by someone involved in the drug trade, whose connection to her will remain a secret here. The primary contact Simone is dealing with is bartering with her to kill someone for him in exchange for Lucy. A life for a life.
Things do not go as planned, and there is a confrontation involving Simone, Lucy and their captor that ends tragically. Simone and Lucy are now on the run in Mexico with no vehicle or plans to get to safety. They realize that the security footage circulating throughout the news and on social media does not show them in a good light. To make matters worse, Damien goes on US television demanding that they turn themselves in, insisting that they have crossed the line.
The plot continues to amaze as Simone and Lucy find out more about each other than they ever knew before. More significantly, we see the extreme lengths to which a mother will go to save her child regardless of the cost. CALLER UNKNOWN definitely goes there, and McAllister has plenty of surprises to unleash before everything is wrapped up.
Teaser
With Lucy about to leave home for university, she and her mother, Simone, depart the UK for a vacation to Texas to spend some quality time together. But when Simone awakens on their first morning in the desert, Lucy is gone. In her place is a cell phone, and a voice on the other line issues a shocking ransom demand. Don’t tell the police. Come to this location. And be prepared to do a deal. Though Simone’s husband urges her to bring in the authorities for help, she knows she can’t take any chances. So that night, she drives to the isolated meet-up. What she finds there changes everything. The mysterious kidnapper doesn’t want money. They want Simone to do something. The unthinkable. A catastrophic chain of events is set in motion, with chilling consequences that extend beyond Simone and her family.
Promo
With Lucy about to leave home for university, she and her mother, Simone, depart the UK for a vacation to Texas to spend some quality time together. But when Simone awakens on their first morning in the desert, Lucy is gone. In her place is a cell phone, and a voice on the other line issues a shocking ransom demand. Don’t tell the police. Come to this location. And be prepared to do a deal. Though Simone’s husband urges her to bring in the authorities for help, she knows she can’t take any chances. So that night, she drives to the isolated meet-up. What she finds there changes everything. The mysterious kidnapper doesn’t want money. They want Simone to do something. The unthinkable. A catastrophic chain of events is set in motion, with chilling consequences that extend beyond Simone and her family.
About the Book
How far would you go to rescue your child? A mother races against the clock --- and finds herself on the wrong side of the law --- in a desperate fight to save her teenage daughter in this pulse-pounding thriller from the author of Reese’s Book Club pick and New York Times bestseller WRONG PLACE WRONG TIME.
There is nothing that Simone won’t do for her daughter, Lucy. The two have always been close, and with Lucy about to leave home for university, they depart the UK for a vacation to Texas to spend some quality time together. But when Simone awakens on their first morning in the desert, Lucy is gone, missing from their rental cabin. In her place is a cell phone, and a voice on the other line issues a shocking ransom demand. Don’t tell the police. Come to this location. And be prepared to do a deal.
Though Simone’s husband urges her to bring in the authorities for help, she knows she can’t take any chances. The kidnappers might kill Lucy if she tells anyone. No mother would take that risk. Instead, that night, she drives to the isolated meet-up.
What she finds there changes everything. The mysterious kidnapper doesn’t want money. They want Simone to do something. The unthinkable.
A catastrophic chain of events is set in motion, with chilling consequences that extend beyond Simone and her family. What follows is a heart-pounding journey through the small towns and punishing deserts of remote Texas, in which Simone’s courage --- and morality --- is pushed to the brink as she discovers what it truly means to be a mother.
Unbearably tense, compassionately told, and full of well-crafted moral dilemmas, CALLER UNKNOWN proves once again why Gillian McAllister’s thrillers are “the best of the best” (Lisa Jewell).
Audiobook available, read by Juliet Rylance
