The Dispatcher

Összefoglaló

Jahn's third novel begins with an instant hook: Ian Hunt, police dispatcher in the small town of Bulls Mouth, Texas, is on shift when he receives a phone call from his 14-year-old daughter, who is missing, declared dead. Maggie, snatched seven years previously and never heard of again, has been entombed in a filthy basement by a hideously needy local couple in the warped belief that she will come to love them as a daughter. Her existence, with only an imaginary friend for company, is terrifying, tormented and eerily febrile by turns, until one day she manages to escape for just long enough to call her father. When the kidnappers snatch her back and go on the run, Hunt, realising that help won't be forthcoming from the indolent local police chief, takes off after them. The Dispatcher, which proceeds at a cracking pace, is a one-sitting, fist-in-mouth read. -- Laura Wilson, Guardian