Land of Make Believe (Land of the Living - Nicci French)

Member Name: kirstymack80

Product:	Land of the Living - Nicci French
Date:	23/08/06 (108 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: gripping, genuinely scary

Disadvantages: genuinely scary!

Abbie Devereaux is in a bind. Literally. She's tied up, gagged and has a noose around her neck. She's in the pitch black with no idea of how she got there, or who her captor is. To prevent herself from going mad, she counts the seconds and estimates how long her captor has gone - and how long it will be until he next decides to give her a drink of water through a straw. Or feed her the sludge that passes for food. Or maybe he'll pull her trousers down and let her use the toilet, which is a bucket.

Abbie tries to plan a seemingly impossible escape. With no idea where she is and weak from hunger and exhaustion, all that is keeping her going is the thought that one day she will be free. A severe blow to the head has caused amnesia and she can remember very little about the last few days. She doesn't know if she will be alive in the next minute, let alone tomorrow. Her captor is keeping her alive just to toy with her. There have been others before her, he's told her. Others that didn't make it. 'Kelly who cried and Abbie who tried. I can make you into a rhyme. Cried, tried, died. It's all the same to me, in the end'. Abbie knows she's on borrowed time.

When she finally does escape, the real world, the one she so missed, is not as she recalls it. Everything is different now, and she can't remember parts of her life. Apparently she'd left her job and her boyfriend just days before she was abducted but has no idea why she made these life changes. Scared and alone and not knowing who to trust, she is determined to piece together her last moments.

* What I thought *

The start of this book reads like a nightmare. The reader is literally taken through every painful moment that Abbie is awake, and it doesn't make a pleasant read. I found this so realistic that it was quite hard to read, even though the confinement is only perhaps 40 pages of the book and I certainly wouldn't recommend reading it late at night if you're on your own. There are no chapters but there are breaks throughout, really drumming into the reader how her torture is dragged out.

We then move onto part 2 which concentrates on the aftermath of the capture, the subsequent days when Abbie is in hospital, the police investigation and the psychiatric assessments. This is around 50 pages and then we have the bulk of the book, which is part 3.

This concentrates on Abbie's confusion at being in the outside world. She is supposed to be 'free' but her capture has changed her forever. With little information to give the police and a history of being a victim of domestic violence and depression, her friends and family are unsure whether to believe her and Abbie is determined to find out what happened in her lost days - and to find her tormentor. A change in her appearance ensures that she remains anonymous in the streets of London. After all, he could be watching her ...

Did I enjoy the book? Certainly the first few pages are cringingly uncomfortable to read. The descriptions of the dank, dirty rag that is forced into Abbie's mouth and the dingy dark room that she's in are so vivid that one can almost imagine oneself to be in her position as prisoner. 'I was his. He was my lover and my father and my God. If he wanted to come in and strangle me, he could.' The shock factor is definitely there and it's a welcome relief when she makes her escape. But even then the reader knows that things are far from over - this is just the beginning.

Her struggle to find the truth, and to claw back her forgotten days makes an interesting and gripping book. This is a credible read, and all the more frightening for it.

This is a page turner, purely because of the pace of the book. It leaves you emotionally wrung out and feeling dread the whole way through. This feeling doesn't go away either. I read the book in three days, in large chunks at a time as you will want to get to the end as quickly as possible and to find out what really happened, and why. For that I have to award this book 5 stars as it holds the attention right from page one and is a disturbing yet fascinating psychological thriller. Highly recommended.

* Other info *

Nicci French is husband and wife duo Nicci Gerard and Sean French. Other works include The Memory Game, The Safe House, Killing Me Softly, Beneath the Skin, The Red Room, Secret Smile and the latest novel just out in paperback, Catch Me When I Fall.

My copy was 30p in a charity shop but obviously I was overjoyed to see that it was given away free with Eve magazine a while ago!

It is available on play.com for £5.49 delivered but the RRP is £6.99

ISBN 0141006501
320 pages published by Penguin Books Ltd (UK)
Year 2005

Thanks for reading.

Summary: Freedom isn't all it's cracked up to be ...