Title: Say Nothing
Author: Brad Parks
Publisher: Dutton Books
Pages: 448
(I got a free ARC from FirstToRead).
Author: Brad Parks
Publisher: Dutton Books
Pages: 448
Say Nothing
by Brad Parks is a thriller that had great potential that it somehow failed to
live up to.
Scott
Sampson is a good father to six-year-old twins Sam and Emma, a loving husband
to wife Alison and a federal judge in a rural area in the US. His beautifully
constructed life is unraveled when he gets a text from his wife, saying that
she will pick up the children after school.
But she
never sent it.
The children
are kidnapped by dangerous people who warn of terrible consequences if the
authorities are brought in. Say nothing, Scott is told.
Soon, he
learns that the kidnappers want to control the verdict of a case, US versus
Skavron, which Scott is to hear the following day.
The kidnap
sends the loving couple to our own sections of the house and our own separate
hells, totally upturning their lives and bringing about a rift in their
marriage. In bed, two feet apart… felt like a thousand miles.
At work,
Scott can barely concentrate. His lack of focus begins to affect his work. When
the kidnappers seek to influence his judgements on pain of hurting his kids, it
seriously impairs his ability to function with effectiveness and integrity.
At first it
seems that they want to influence his judgement with regard to Skavron. When he
gives them the judgement they seek, Sam is released, while Emma is detained
further. It is at this time that Scott becomes aware of another case he is to
hear: A
multi-billion dollar patent infringement case, Palgraff versus ApotheGen.
Scott has no
idea which of the two parties might have kidnapped Emma, and therefore what verdict he is
expected to deliver to get Emma back.
He hires
a private investigator, intent on finding Emma, but all his efforts prove
fruitless. When the PI is murdered by the kidnappers, Scott is no closer to finding
his daughter.
As the date
for the hearing nears, will he and Alison find their daughter? Or will they
suffer the greatest loss of their lives?
The book is
written in the first person past tense point of view of Scott. We also get the
third person past tense point of view of the kidnappers, two brothers of
unknown ethnicity who have kidnapped the twins on behalf of an unknown person.
Because we have the kidnappers’ perspective, we know what condition the twins
are being kept in. but that does not diminish the sense of anxiety we feel at
the thought of the six-year-old Emma, who is asthmatic, suffering at the hands
of the brutish and sadistic kidnappers.
Since Scott
is a judge and the fate of his children hinges on a court case, we get a lot of
what goes on behind the scenes. At first, he thinks that the kidnappers want
Rayshaun Skavron, a smalltime drug dealer freed, but they want him sentenced on
two counts, subsequently.
Scott’s
views on parenting stem largely from the author’s own, that’s easy to tell.
It’s something that all parents will agree with.
Scott’s love
for his children leads him to speak at length about the bond between parents
and children. He says, There’s something about having genuine fun with your
kids that’s good for the soul. Another time he says, Watching your children
sleep is one of the great joys of parenting.
It is this
bond that helps him realise that It’s far more distressing when something
happens to your kids than when it happens to you.
Even after
Sam is returned, you can feel his pain at the loss of Emma when he says, each
of us trying to adjust to a family that had so unexpectedly morphed from square
to triangle.
He also
makes comments about the bond between Alison and her three sisters who play an important role in supporting the couple, Internally fractured yet
externally united. The world over, it’s the very definition of sisterhood.
I also liked
the description of sociopaths. They were like houses. Where all the wiring is
done, except the electrician has forgotten to make that final connection to the
thing that makes us human, leaving the entire dwelling dark and unfit for
occupation.
The story
becomes powerful when you realise that Scott, who began his story by telling us
he is content and that he has it all, is about to lose everything valuable in
his life. One by one, all the props upon which his life depended are taken away from him.
And yet the
drama of it all, of a harried judge about to face impeachment proceedings, a
wife in the final stage of breast cancer, a little girl in captivity, gets
diluted with the revelation of the person responsible for the kidnap.
The ending,
though inevitable, was very sad.
(I got a free ARC from FirstToRead).