Published by Tilbury Publishing on June 24, 2021
Format: eARC
Source: Author
Pages: 409
Amazon UK
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Also by this author: The Last One To See Her, A Prayer For The Broken
I have both your sons, Mr Levitt. One of them must die. You choose.
Widower Sean Levitt receives the ominous message in the post a few days after his teenage boys go missing on their way to army cadets.
As time progresses, the abductor makes increasingly horrific demands of Sean by sending him DVDs, and telling him to post videos online of the shocking assignments he sets him.
One Must Die is the story of one man’s fight to keep his sons alive, and the terrible lengths he must go to in order to do so.
Can Sean do what the police have failed to do and find his sons?
Or will the abductor achieve his twisted aim of destroying his entire family?
This isn’t my first rodeo with #TwistedTilbury but this might be his darkest one that I have read. Getting in the mind of the villain here made me need to have a shower to wash off the grimness he brought to the table.
Some of the things that happened in the book did leave me feeling squeamish at times. I must admit I did flinch a few times. The mind of this guy was dark, so dark there was no light to come back to.
I must admit I was scratching my head with trying to figure how everyone was linked and when we were told it was something I didn’t foresee. However, I continued to scratch my head as to why he was gunning for Sean more than anyone over a different character. Sean got such a rubbish end of it for something that I felt wasn’t his fault. It gives you an idea of how messed up the perpetrator really was!!!
We spend about 95% of the book fearing for the boys. The torture and treatment were realistic it was just so worrying and for a parent to be in that situation, god it doesn’t bear thinking about. The impossible is being asked of you and it makes you wonder who will make it out alive.
Sometimes you find when you have the big reveal of why the baddie is doing what they are doing and occasionally you feel sympathetic slightly. However, I felt none of that here. I wanted him to meet a grisly end, I wanted him to feel all the pain and suffering. Not just for what he was doing to Sean but to everyone else! Just no words.
It is disturbing and action-packed and if you let it, it will sucker punch you. It is always a journey that you are never quite sure where you are going and whether you will make it back in one piece.
Until next time xxx
Reading this book contributed to these challenges:
Carla says
You made me cringe just reading your review. I want to read this one, but I am worried I might be a bit squeamish. Nice review Zoe.