I was very skeptical before I started this book, since it is billed as "a novel in reverse." I really like Deaver, but I'm not usually a big fan of messing with the time line in stories. It took a bit to really capture my interest, but it definitely did!
The book starts (ends) with a woman waiting to hear from her kidnap negotiators about her daughter, but when the door opens, the kidnapper comes in. It goes backward from there. One of the plot twists was very obvious to me right away, so I was worried that I would have no surprises and that made me enjoy the book less. Luckily, Deaver had a couple more surprises in store, so I was still happily taken aback by a couple of last minute plot twists.
Spoiler Alert! One of the big drawbacks of this story for me is that there are no good guys. Maybe the police partners who play a very fringe role in the story, but mostly everyone is a bad guy doing bad things for their own gain. It's nice to have someone to root for, and this book misses that.
There is swearing in this book, especially a large use of the f-word. I don't remember Deaver using it so often before, but I found it very overdone in this particular book.
Since it is shorter than his usual, this book is worth the time. I don't know if it would be if it was longer, though. It is limited because of its structure, but the structure also makes it interesting if only for the novelty of it!
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