#1 New York Times bestselling author Tami Hoag keeps you guessing in her most harrowing thriller yet. But sifting through Genevieve Gauthiers tangled web of lovers and sorting through a cast of local lowlifes brings more questions than answers. Gripping til the end! Nick is also dealing with a new boss, Kelvin Dutrow, who he doesn't get along with. A group for book bloggers and reviews of Edelweiss titles. I thought I knew who the killer was but NOPE! 1996-2023, Amazon.com, Inc. or its affiliates, Select a location to see product availability, Reviewed in the United States on January 19, 2023, I've been a fan of Tami Hoag for years. An unfathomable loss or an unthinkable crime? I credit Tami Hoag with getting my interested in the romance genre. #1New York Timesbestselling author Tami Hoag keeps you guessing in her most harrowing thriller yet. The detectives wonder: Why kill the boy and let a witness go? Oh, my God in heaven! the woman exclaimed. When Detective Nick Fourcade enters the home of Genevieve Gauthier outside the sleepy town of Bayou Breaux, Louisiana, the bloody crime scene that awaits him is both the most brutal and the most confusing he's ever seen. Even in the scene where Greta tries to prove it to Malcolm that the doll is alive, she first knocks on the wall and only then the house begins to creak and the doll moves. I just finished reading "The Boy." Hoag follows several threads as the story unfolds, casting suspicion on a number of characters and tipping her hand only toward the end as Nick and Annie sort through the confusion and begin to put together a clear picture of where everyone fits in the puzzle. Although the mother has defensive wounds, its not clear why she survived and why someone would murder an innocent child in his bed. What had followed that call had been days and nights of breathless anxiety, Annie clinging by her mental fingertips to hope that ebbed and flowed like an erratic tide. In the middle of the night, blood drips down from the ceiling on Coles face and he assumes that is Greta is doing this just to get him out of there. native I like that this book is based in La. An example of a very effective image is found when Nick surveils a suspect at night in a boat on the bayou across from the mans house: As shallow and delicate as a milkweed pod, the pirogue skated across the water, skimming over the duckweed and water hyacinth, deftly slipping between the cypress trees.. Very few people had ever been invited past even the first of his fortress walls., Hoag is also skilled with the smaller touches. . He had always fiercely guarded his internal life, even as a boy . Looking forward to more great books read like this . Would they call the police at someone knocking in the middle of the night? It's the kind of book that you hate when it ends because the next book you read will probably be a let down! The Boy is an excellent police procedural. Annie Broussard listened to the thunder rumble in the distance. In the final moments of the movie, when she decides to kill Brahms and save Malcolm, she liberates herself from her skewed sense of attachment towards all the destructive people in her life. Is the missing teenager, Nora, a victim, or something worse? With pressure mounting from a tough, no-nonsense new sheriff, the media, and the parents of Bayou Breaux, Nick and Annie dig deep into the dual mysteries. Rather disturbing book about the capabilities of children but will keep you guessing to the end. Help me. They would be horrified without even knowing the true horror of what had happened. And even though Annies mother had exited her life without warning when she was small, Annie had never imagined Tante Fanchon doing the same. Absolutely fantastic read from start to finish! Malcolm tells her that Brahms was once a real boy and was the only child of Mr. and Mrs. Heelshire. The new sheriff was an outsider, a usurper; too stiff, too arrogant, too brash. This shows that the doll was never actually moving on its own but was being moved by the real Brahms who lives in the walls. This was a tale full of many secrets and as many suspects too! Complicating the investigation is a new sheriff, Kelvin Dutrow, who has an enlarged ego and a powerful desire to fire Nick. The publisher has supplied this book in DRM Free form with digital watermarking. He was frowning in his sleep, just as his father did. The Force by Don Winslow- Feature and Review. This is my first by this author and it was so good, a lovely dark, intense, disturbing, and at times heartbreaking, bit of crime fiction. Mainly, mystery/thriller, Contemporary and Historical fiction, Biography/Memoir and True Crime, and a little Romance, too! I generally like Tammy Hoags writing. The headlights blinded her. That buck stops with me, does it not?, You cant give him what you dont have.. However, it later turns out that the whole vacation thing was just a lie. Headlights appeared around a bend in the road. Wow, this is one surprising good crime mystery. He wasnt one of them. Who would murder a child and leave the only witness behind? Mrs. Heelshire tells Greta that Brahms is shy and only moves when no one is watching. Come back to bed, Toinette, he said. There is no end to the amount of twists, and the author is adept at misleading her readers into suspecting who the killer is. Just when he asks her to give her a goodnight kiss, she stabs him with a screwdriver and gets out of there with Malcolm. The boy, dressed in Spider-Man pajamas, is lying in a pool of blood in his bedroom, stabbed some 10 times in the chest and face. They had no clear suspects. So read on ahead to get a better hold on what the movie tries to portray. A book that keeps you guessing. There is no evidence of forced entry, not a clue that points to a motive. It also reflects on why Mr. and Mrs. Heelshire committed suicide. Her heart swelled to overflowing with love every time she looked at him. Nick in particular is a figment of an over-heated imagination. She stood in the middle of the road and waved her arms above her head. An unfathomable loss or an unthinkable crime? This had been going on for weeks now, ever since that night in June, when a call had awoken her from a deep, peaceful sleep. I was engaged the whole way through and will certainly be reading more. Some of the secondary characters are rather two-dimensional, though, and Hoag seems to have a problem finding a positive male character to write about. {{ format_drm_information.format_name }} unrestricted, {{ format_drm_information.format_name }} {{format_drm_information.page_percent}}, {{ format_drm_information.format_name }} off, {{ read_aloud_information.format_name }} on, {{ read_aloud_information.format_name }} off. There is the unsolved case of the Theriot girl, which Nick constantly gets hounded over. The Theriots want someone to blame, Nick said. This pair first appeared in A Thin Dark Line (1997). There he finds seven-year-old KJ Gauthier has been brutally stabbed. Annie wouldnt have gone so far as to drill a hole in a dime, but she secretly wished for some protection against that now-familiar sense of dread that sat like a rock in her stomach. The impact rattled her brain and knocked the wind from her. He bent his head and sighed, his warm breath stirring the hair at the nape of her neck as he moved close again, corralling her between his arms, trapping her between himself and the window. Powered by WordPress.com VIP. Genevieve's seven-year-old son, KJ, has been murdered by an alleged intruder, yet Genevieve is alive and well. You can read this eBook on any device that supports DRM-free EPUB or DRM-free PDF format. I just finished reading "The Boy." In its initial moments, it is foreshadowed that Greta is actually an American and she only took up this job to escape her previous abusive relationship with a man named Cole. She slapped at the screen door, her strength draining out of her, rushing out of her like water down a hole. The sound echoed the restlessness that stirred inside her. The flailing arms. Even after moving on ahead with her life, she jumps into a toxic relationship with Brahms without even knowing who he truly is. Greta goes to sleep with the doll and promises it that shell never leave while Cole sleeps in a different room. He groaned deep in his throat and took her mouth again, with more urgency, sweeping a hand down the curve of her side and pulling her hips hard against his. Is Nora a victim, or something worse? In the beginning of the movie, when Mrs. Heelshire tells Greta about the rules of the house, she makes it clear that Brahms likes his music loud and even when shes reading something to him, she should be loud and clear with her words. Could she have killed her own child to free herself from the burden of motherhood, or is the loss of her beloved boy pushing her to the edge of insanity? If she knew the identity of her molester, that secret was locked inside the labyrinth of her mind. Who would murder a child and leave the only witness behind? Genevieve's seven-year-old son, KJ, has been murdered by an alleged intruder, yet Genevieve is alive and well. I cant stand her main character the detective. In her delightfully complex ensemble of characters, it turns out that Kemp has a checkered past, having gone from a veteran cop to a CSI examiner. They would see the whites of her eyes and the red of the blood that streaked down her cheeks and across her jaw. #1 New York Times bestselling author Tami Hoag keeps you guessing in her most harrowing thriller yet. Could not put this book down AND when I had to put it down could not wait to get back to it. This police detective couple are projected as a pair off the cover of a Harlequin Romance novel. More so, she also has a restraining order against this ex-boyfriend. Her romantic suspense novels got me into the genre during high school, and. Doll horror, if not pulled off correctly, can often become more of a parody that no one would take seriously. Help me! Things died in the swamp all the time. Is the missing teenager, Nora, a victim, or something worse? Maybe she should just lie down and quit. He thought in French, spoke French to their son, made love in French. She tried to gasp for air, frantic, thinking she might die. Do we have to fight now?. Do you understand? He is, indeed, still with them. Ive enjoyed some of her other books but I thought this one was a disaster. The book is filled with some very strong characters and I felt so many emotions while reading about them, like Sharon and Cameron who broke my heart and then broke it again. But the truth is a lot more complex than that. Early in bestseller Hoag's thoughtful, character-driven sequel to 1997's A Thin Dark Line, Nick Fourcade, a detective with the Bayou Breaux, La., police department, arrives at "a small, sad rectangle of cheap siding and asphalt shingles squatting on concrete block pilings in a yard of dirt and weeds." . Almost from the start I didn't like Nick Fourcade. Our victim is a little boy.. On Brahms 8th birthday, Emily went to play with Brahms in the Heelshire mansion and never returned. This is nothing but thug behavior from a rogue cop. Michael J. McCanns novelSorrow Lakewas a finalist for the Hammett Prize for literary excellence in North American crime fiction. It deals with the dark side of human nature and how the face a person shows the public does not always match the one behind closed doors. He calls her to the room and shows her a bloody inscription on the wall that says Get Out. Realizing that Brahms did it using rat blood, she tries explaining it to him, but he refuses to believe her. Thank you to the publisher for sending me a copy in exchange for an honest review. So many twist's and turns keeping you hooked and on the edge of your seat action. Being a La. I don't even know where to begin with this story. She was painted with it. As Annie interviews people close to KJ, she discovers that his twelve-year-old babysitter has disappeared. I couldnt finish this. Nick and Annie struggle to understand why the murderer killed the child, but not the mother. He had grown up a swampers son, speaking French at home as a fair number of families in these parts did. Genevieve's seven-year-old son, KJ, has been murdered by an alleged intruder, yet Genevieve is alive and well. The ending of this book begets tragedy in the wake of violence. As always, the wave of heat was instantaneous, washing over her, through her, pooling deep within her body. I have read Tami Hoag's work for many years and always enjoyed them. Could she have something to do with the disappearance of Nora Florette, or is the troubled teenager the key to the murder? On her face. Solving the case is made more difficult by the new sheriff of Partout Parish who loves to make a show for the press all the while butting in and trying to control investigative procedure. Get help and learn more about the design. But soon, she discovers that the doll holds far more secrets than she had initially imagined. As always Tami has written another plot twisting book. Greta, the main protagonist of the film, accepts the job of babysitting a young boy, but to her surprise, this boy turns out to be a porcelain doll named Brahms. The car leapt forward, and she fell to the side, trying to grab hold of a door handle. It was a vicious cycle, and every deputy and detective took that tension home to his or her family at the end of their shift. Thud! Copyright 2023 Tami Hoag. But when she arrives there, it turns out that she is expected to be the nanny of a life-sized porcelain doll. What did happen? If you are going to ignore something that was important before just take it out or have it not be such a big deal. She wobbled to her feet like a newborn deer and staggered on, one foot in front of the other, her focus on the house. When KJ's sometimes babysitter, twelve-year-old Nora Florette, is reported missing the very next day, the town fears a maniac is preying on their children. Is someone from Genevieve's past or present responsible for the death of her son? When her seven-year-old son KJ is murdered by an alleged intruder and she is left alive, police are left asking who would commit a crime so gruesome and leave the only witness alive. This police detective couple are projected as a pair off the cover of a Harlequin Romance novel. It also analyzed reviews to verify trustworthiness. The night waited, ever-patient, oblivious to her pain, not caring if she lived or died. That thunders not the only storm brewing tonight. The thunder rolled after it and right along her nerves. Cole gets a fit of anger and he smashes the dolls face. Youre up, too, cher, he said. The Boy Tami Hoag January 2019 Hachette Book . Greta comes to the Heelshire mansion 20 years after the Brahms death to babysit the doll. She liked to think she was too logical and practical to believe in signs and portents, but she couldnt escape the fact that she had been raised by superstitious people in a superstitious place. I also loved how well plotted and unpredictable it was, it kept me guessing all the way. Down the road she could see the outline of a house, a shabby little box of a house, a yard with an old pickup parked near a sagging porch. Mrs. Heelshire also tells her that they save all of their uneaten food and it is pretty obvious that all of this food goes to Brahms. I need to hold you for a while., She tipped her face up to look at him and met his lips with hers.