“You have a very lovely little girl,” breathed the voice on the phone.
On the longest night of the year, single mom Susan Young is thrust into her worst possible nightmare: her infant daughter, Veda, has been kidnapped. His price for Veda’s safe return isn’t money, though. It’s vengeance for a crime perpetrated with her friend – and now ex-husband, Phillip -- when they were just kids. He wants Susan to suffer, and he’s prepared to make it happen if she doesn’t comply with his every demand, no matter how odd it may seem. Adding to her ever-increasing horror, Phillip has gone missing too.
In the middle of a blinding snowstorm, Susan is steered by this maniac through small New England villages and subjects her to all sorts of horrors along the way, including digging up dead bodies. Determined to get her child back from this lunatic, she’s willing to do anything no matter the price. In the end, she may end up paying the ultimate price.
The foremost question in my mind was who the hell is this guy? Is he some kind of sicko serial killer that picked her as a victim? An unseen witness to their childhood crime? A relative bent on revenge? The possibilities are endless but this is, after all, a horror novel and nothing should be obvious or as common as a garden-variety serial killer. Clues to the lunatic’s identity aren’t apparent until much later in the story.
The story being firmly rooted in Stephen King’s stomping grounds is a bit disconcerting for me because I’ve been a longtime fan. In a way, it borders on sacrilegious. But the author has carved out a very nice plot of land of his own and gives it his own scary flavor. The unusual premise and a very short time span is enough to set this apart from anything I’ve read in a long time.
Don’t even pick this up unless you’re fully prepared to finish it in one sitting. The full-tilt tempo won’t let up until the very last page. I’d suggest leaving the lights on, too…this is one scary read.
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Hardcover: 208 pages
Publisher: Ballantine Books (September 26, 2006)
ISBN: 0345487478
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