WHEN an experienced profiler and psychotherapist finds a
baby boy abandoned on the back seat of her car, it opens the door on to a world
of online menace that could bring deadly danger to both herself and her family.
But the past is never far away for Kez Lanyon, and with
secrets of her own to guard, she might have no way of avoiding an unwelcome
revisit to the shadowy corners of her life.
At a time when we are becoming more and more prey to
deepfake, online radicalisation, child exploitation and extreme misogyny, the perils
posed by the dark web are being exposed on an almost daily basis... and it’s a
topic that popular author Dorothy Koomson is not afraid to tackle head on.
Koomson (pictured below), whose wickedly clever novels have earned her the
sobriquet Queen of the Big Reveal, works her special magic on this gritty, emotion-packed
and heart-stopping psychological thriller which plunges readers into the terrifying
dilemmas of a young social media influencer.
Despite her
years as a professional therapist, Kez Lanyon is shocked when she finds a baby in
her car after a book event at a library, and an unsigned note asking her to
take care of him.
Kez, who has occasionally helped the police, and worked in prisons and other institutions, has a pretty good idea who the mother is... 20-year-old Brandee, a popular social media star with a troubled background who once lived in Kez’s family house. Brandee recently dropped out of the limelight and if the internet rumours are true, Kez knows that Brandee’s life is in danger. But what she doesn’t know is when Brandee had a baby, who the father is, and where the young woman is now.
Kez is torn. Should she wait and hope that Brandee turns up safe and well, should she simply take care of the baby as she has been asked to do, or should she risk her whole family by returning to her dangerous past where less-than-legal contacts from her previous job could be the only way to help save this woman? Meanwhile, time is running out for Brandee... can Kez find her before it’s too late?
Koomson delivers a multi-layered mind maze of festering secrets, moral dilemmas and simmering tensions as the truth and lies of Brandee’s current life – and Kez’s past life – spill over into shocking revelations, emotion-packed discoveries and a race-against-time mystery. And with a narrative that alternates between Brandee’s many social media posts – which include disturbing events and revealing behind-the-scenes content – and Kez’s desperate battle to track down the missing woman both online and in the real world, the speculation becomes wilder and the possibilities more blood-chilling.
In classic Koomson style, each character – not least the intensely
complex Kez – is superbly drawn and the twists and turns keep coming in a plot
littered with questions about identity, safety on line, and what the author
describes in her ‘bonus content’ at the end of the book as the internet’s deep
and seemingly endless ‘rabbit hole’ of terrifying danger. So take a deep breath, prepare for a rollercoaster ride, and
you’ll be racing to the end for a final reveal that ensures the Queen of the
Big Reveal won’t be losing her crown any time soon!
(Headline Review, paperback, £9.99)
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