‘I Know You’ by Erik Therme

Synopsis

‘I can help you save your sister. But I need something from you …’

Sisters Bree and Alissa Walker share a special bond. Neglected by their parents, they have always looked out for one another. But one day, sixteen-year-old Alissa goes missing. When Bree discovers her green backpack with all her belongings, abandoned on the steps of their run-down trailer, she knows that something bad has happened …

Then she receives a chilling text message. Someone has Alissa. But Bree will have to give up something very precious in exchange.

Desperate to save Alissa, Bree looks at everyone close to their family. She’s sure that Alissa’s best friend is keeping something back about her little sister and a boy at school, and why has their estranged uncle, who they’ve not seen in years, been hanging around again?

It soon becomes clear that the person behind the message knows a lot about the dark truths within the Walker family and will go to any lengths to get revenge. And as the search for Alissa continues, Bree discovers something about her brother Tyler that she wishes she hadn’t, a dangerous secret, which is also the key to bringing her little sister back home … 

 

My Review

I have read a couple of Erik’s books now and I thoroughly enjoyed them.  He is certainly one of those authors, whose books just need to be bought as soon as they are released.  That’s how I feel anyway.  I read the synopsis for ‘I Know You’ and I was immediately intrigued.  I couldn’t wait to start reading and all I can say after having read the book is ‘wow’.  I totally, utterly and absolutely loved reading ‘I Know You’ but more about that in a bit.

I really felt for the Walker children.  There are two girls, Bree and Alissa and one boy Tyler.  They haven’t exactly had the best of starts and have been victims of more than one form of abuse over the years.  Their parents aren’t exactly great.  The father is fond of an alcoholic beverage or several and the mother is a hard working woman, which is to be applauded but she is so busy at work that she barely has time for her children.  In a way they have had to care for themselves and bring themselves up for a long time.  Bree is more of a mother figure to Alissa than their mother is.  I felt for Bree because she has to put her life on hold and run around after her siblings. She is that busy being worried and concerned about everybody else that her own needs and welfare have slid to the bottom of the priority list.  Alissa is a bit of a tearaway who frequently ‘leaves’ home but she usually returns.  Bree isn’t worried about Alissa’s latest disappearance until she realises that something is very wrong with the picture as the saying goes.  What follows is a terrifying ordeal for Bree as she tries to wrestle with the moral dilemma of potentially sacrificing one sibling to save the other.  I am not going to say anything else about what happens in the story because I would hate to give too much away and spoil the book for anybody else.

Oh my giddy aunt, this was one of those books that grabbed my attention from the moment I opened the front cover.  As soon as I got to the bottom of the page, I knew that this book was going to be an unputdownable read and so it proved to be.  I think that I felt so much sorrow for the Walker children that I had to keep reading to see what happened to the children and to see who was responsible for Alissa’s abduction.  Reading this book became an addiction and I felt as though I was an addict in constant need of her next fix.  I picked the book up only intending to read a couple of chapters but that intention soon went out of the window and I was still sat there well over half a dozen chapters later.  I picked up the book at the right time for me, because I needed a distraction from the pain I was feeling following an operation.  Well ‘I Know You’ was certainly a distraction and then some.  Whilst I was reading this book, I felt no pain.

‘I Know You’ is brilliantly written and plotted with a cast of characters who are so well described that they seem to jump off the page and come to life as it were.  At one point I had to keep reminding myself that the characters were fictional and therefore not real.  I found that there were times when I wanted to jump inside the pages of the book to sort out whoever was misbehaving at that point in the story.  Erik has one of those writing styles that draws you in and won’t let you go.  He has such a way of writing that I really did feel as though I was part of the story myself.  For me, the story hits the ground running and maintains the pace throughout.

In short, I thoroughly enjoyed reading ‘I Know You’ and I will definitely recommending it to other readers.  I can’t wait to read what Erik comes up with next.  The score on the Ginger Book Geek board is a very well deserved 5* out of 5*.