
Hope has gone. Warren saw her being taken from her prison under their father's house but was too scared to intervene. Now he wishes he'd been brave enough to stop Rob, Emma and Tom kidnapping her. His father is furious, but it's the behaviour of Warren's normally-cowed mother that's most frightening. For years she has known her daughter was safe in the hole under the conservatory. But now Hope is out in the world, and anything could happen to her. Mum has to get her back. She's going to start by doing something terrible to Hope's kidnappers, and Warren must help. Rob, Tom and Emma have other things on their mind. When they took Hope, it was to save her. But now Hope has disappeared. Could she somehow have escaped to the world of miniature people where Rob's friend Lorn is fighting for survival? Just when the three friends need to be closest, Emma disappears and Tom starts acting really weirdly. Rob is sure the man with blue eyes has something to do with it. He's seen him in town again. If he dares to confront him, will he be able to save his pals? And if he's wrong, what price will they all end up paying?
The disappearance of a girl held captive beneath a house triggers a desperate search that forces her brother to confront his own complicity and his mother's escalating violence. Warren, haunted by his failure to prevent the abduction of his sister, Hope, finds himself caught between his father's rage and his mother's increasingly erratic and dangerous behavior. As the kidnappers—Rob, Emma, and Tom—lose track of their captive, the narrative shifts between the claustrophobic reality of the family home and the mysterious, potentially surreal world where Hope may have vanished. The story utilizes a multi-perspective framework to track the fracturing relationships between the kidnappers and the mounting threat posed by an enigmatic man with blue eyes.
Readers frequently highlight the unsettling atmosphere that permeates the narrative, noting how the author maintains a high level of tension throughout the story. Discussion often centers on the moral ambiguity of the characters, particularly the kidnappers who claim to have acted with good intentions. Critics often point to the effective use of shifting perspectives to obscure the truth and heighten the sense of confusion as the plot progresses. The balance between the grounded domestic drama and the more abstract, potentially supernatural elements remains a frequent topic of debate among those analyzing the book's pacing and thematic depth.
Page Count:
256
Publication Date:
2010-03-01
ISBN-10:
0192727176
ISBN-13:
9780192727176
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