Hunting Annabelle

By: Wendy Heard

Narrated by: Tim Chiou

Length: 9 hrs and 3 mins

Publisher's summary

“Her scream echoes in my memory. I know what happened. Whether anyone believes me or not, I know.”

Sean Suh is done with killing. After serving three years in a psychiatric prison, he’s determined to stay away from temptation. But he can’t resist Annabelle - beautiful, confident, incandescent Annabelle - who alone can see past the monster to the man inside. The man he’s desperately trying to be.

Then Annabelle disappears.

Sean is sure she’s been kidnapped - he witnessed her being taken firsthand - but the police are convinced Sean himself is at the center of this crime. And he must admit, his illness has caused him to “lose time” before. What if there’s more to what happened than he’s able to remember?

Though haunted by the fear that it might be better for Annabelle if he never finds her, Sean can’t bring himself to let go of her without a fight. To save her, he’ll have to do more than confront his own demons.... He’ll have to let them loose.

A chilling, deeply suspenseful pause-resister set in the 1980s, Hunting Annabelle is a stunning debut that will leave you breathless to the very end.

©2018 Wendy Heard (P)2018 Harlequin Enterprises, Limited

great perspective

great story from a different perspective. it was not what I expected, the description with colors was vivid, I imagined most of the story as though it were drawn.

Hello Darkness, My Old Friend (No Spoilers)

This is a delicious and mysterious psychological thriller by a debut author, and I can’t wait to see what she writes next.

This story will have you second-guessing every character and every event that occurs from start to finish. There’s so much suspense that it deserves all 5 of the dark, twisty, and murderous stars that I awarded it.

Here are my 10 favorite things about it, with no spoilers:

1. This is Dexter level on the murderously creepy scale.

2. I love a potentially unreliable narrator, especially when I desperately want him to be somewhat reliable but can’t be sure if he actually ever is or not

3. It’s so layered and nuanced. I feel like I need to go back and read it again right now, so I probably will. I want to take everything in again, since so much happened so fast.

4. Heard does some amazing things with description. I feel like I’m right there seeing, feeling, tasting, smelling, and hearing it all.

5. The characterization is so complicated and fascinating.

6. The mom. Wow. She’s something else. Talk about an intense side character.

7. The audiobook is also amazing, and I love the narrator, Tim Chiou. I wish he would narrate more books.

8. Talk about kicking a character when he is down…repeatedly. There are no easy fixes or lazy solutions in this story. Sean just has to cross all of the muck to get to the other side, and it just keeps getting deeper.

9. Here’s what it felt like to read this one: “Okay, I know exactly what is happening now”. . . twist. . . “So I was wrong before but now I’ve got it”. . . Twist. . .” I’m pretty sure”. . . twist. . . “It just has to be”. . . twist. . .”Oh, my God! It’s totally”. . . twist. WTF???

10. The cover is perfection. I adore it. I have some bookmarks, and I really want to cut one of them apart to highlight book quotes from this novel between the title, kind of like the cover. That may happen.

As far as I’m concerned, this book is A+ from start to finish, and you should all go out and snatch it up for some murdery holiday reading (come on, we all know how you really feel about those in-laws).

It would also make a great present for your favorite book nerd friends, your least favorite family members, and all frenemies. Books like this can be a great way to say, “Hey, everything is fine. I just might want to murder you today,” or even, “I swear, I’m not trying to frame you. Mostly.” ;)

So good

this book was amazing and the reader captured it perfectly with all the twists and turns this book is 100% worth it i would highly recommend!

Weird characters, okay storyline

I listened to this book over the course of 2 days on a road trip. It kept me mostly entertained, but I grew tired of many parts of the book. The characters aren’t likeable, which is fine sometimes, but I think they hindered the book overall. The storyline was interesting and there were a few twists. I feel that the book dragged out longer than it needed to and focus was lost at times.

A Story with a Twist

I actually really liked how this story took a different turn from where I expected it to go. Regardless of if I agreed with the choices made by the characters, the motivation and blatant disregard of societal norms were fascinating to follow.

Great Listen!

This was a great story. Highly recommended for crime and thriller enthusiasts. I listened to all 9+ hours in 2 days!

Intriguing

This novel is a great one where you get a first hand view of how a person dealing with a major mental illness struggles and what happens when so extraordinary circumstances occur.

Keeps you on edge

Wonderful story that keeps you on edge guessing what will happen next. Everytime I thought I knew another turn happened.

YES AND NO

I think this was the most ???? book I have ever read. It was amazing and interesting, suspenseful & coveting for most of the book. But then things changed & not in a pleasant way. It is hard to explain the direction this book ended up taking but it hinged on the "Gross'. Villains became super villains. Any hope for normalcy went downhill fast. the story plot lost most of its interesting climb for me for me and I was left in a mystery that went over the hill and down the drain.

Disappointing

I don’t understand all the rave reviews about this book. I kept waiting for it to get better. I kept waiting for the plot twist and when it did come, it was truly disappointing!