Steve-Calvert.co.uk
Steve-Calvert.co.uk
A Passion For Horror
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By
Dean Koontz Visit the offical Dean Koontz website Mitch Rafferty owns a gardening business and he is a good gardener, but like most gardeners he is not rolling in money. In fact, Mitch only has about eleven thousand dollars in the bank, which is pretty good for a gardener, but not good enough. Mitch needs two million dollars and he has sixty hours to get his hands on it. Why does a gardener need so much money? Well, not to buy a couple of new spades and thirty feet of garden hose, that's for sure. The two million is what it will cost Mitch to get his wife back.
The call comes in at 11:43 on a Monday morning. Mitch is busy putting some empty plant pots onto the back of his pickup, and when he answers his mobile his wife Holly tells him that she loves him. Whatever happens, she loves him. Then she screams and Mitch isn't talking to Holly anymore. The man who replaces her is cool and calm and very good at making Mitch's wife scream. And if Mitch doesn't come up with the cash, or if he goes to the police, the kidnapper promises to cut of Holly's fingers, one by one, before cutting out her tongue and eyes and leaving her to die slowly. He is a nasty guy and he tells Mitch all of this without the slightest hint of emotion. To him it is just business and just to make sure that Mitch realizes that he means business the guy on the phone says, "See that guy across the street?" Mitch turns, to look at the guy across the street, just in time to see him take a head shot and hit the deck. Dead. The guy on the phone knows how to make a point, and although he is a good gardener Mitch is an even better husband and there is no way that he will allow anything to happen to Holly.
A man has just been gunned down in broad daylight so it is not long before the police arrive, but Mitch cannot tell them the truth and has to pretend to be as baffled as they are about what has happened. The guy was walking his dog for Christ's sakes and neither one of them had left a mess on the sidewalk. Well. not until the bullet took away half the guy's face anyway. One of the detectives, Sandy Taggart, seems pretty shrewd though, and Mitch realizes that he will have to be very careful when talking to him. But the guy is like a blood hound, blood has been spilt and it seems like he is going to hound Mitch until he finds out why.
The Husband is 453 pages long and the action is non stop. Mitch barely has time to stop and take a breath. He is on a tight deadline, the kidnappers have got him pretty much boxed in whichever way he turns, and they have managed to make it look like he has killed his wife. So if Mitch doesn't come across with the money not only will he loose the woman he loves, he will also be charged with her murder. He can't go to the police. Not even Taggart. For all Mitch Knows Taggart could be in with them and, either way, the kidnappers seem to have Mitch under constant surveillance. In the end Mitch is forced to turn to his brother, Anson, for help, only to discover that Anson has a rather surprising secret.
I enjoyed reading The Husband and can quite honestly say that I have never read anything quite like it. There are any number of stories about people being held to ransom, but I have never before heard of one where the abducted person is the wife of a normal working class man. What a great idea! If there is one question that the reader is forced to ask themselves while reading The Husband, it is probably this: How far would you be prepared to go to save someone you love? Well. think about it. How far? Would you kill? By the end of the book Mitch has his answers and has maybe even surprised himself. The Husband is probably more thriller than horror, but it is a great read and I can highly recommend it. |
