What She Knew

A Novel

By: Gilly Macmillan

Narrated by: Penelope Rawlins, Dugald Bruce-Lockhart

Length: 12 hrs and 2 mins

Publisher's summary

In her enthralling debut, Gilly Macmillan explores a mother's search for her missing son, weaving a taut psychological thriller as gripping and skillful as The Girl on the Train and The Guilty One.

In a heartbeat, everything changes....

Rachel Jenner is walking in a Bristol park with her eight-year-old son, Ben, when he asks if he can run ahead. It's an ordinary request on an ordinary Sunday afternoon, and Rachel has no reason to worry - until Ben vanishes.

Police are called, search parties go out, and Rachel, already insecure after her recent divorce, feels herself coming undone. As hours and then days pass without a sign of Ben, everyone who knew him is called into question, from Rachel's newly married ex-husband to her mother-of-the-year sister. Inevitably, media attention focuses on Rachel, too, and the public's attitude toward her begins to shift from sympathy to suspicion.

As she desperately pieces together the threadbare clues, Rachel realizes that nothing is quite as she imagined it to be, not even her own judgment. And the greatest dangers may lie not in the anonymous strangers of every parent's nightmares but behind the familiar smiles of those she trusts the most.

Where is Ben? The clock is ticking....

©2015 Gilly Macmillan (P)2015 Oakhill Publishing Ltd

Hasn't gotten the recognition it deserves

This book was hard to put down. I'm really surprised that it isn't a #1 bestseller. You know from the description that it's about a boy who turns up missing and the media gets overly involved, pointing fingers at the mother and others. There's much more to this book than that. Surprising family secrets come out and just when you think you've solved it, another twist will come into play. You will keep guessing until the end!

If you like mysteries, this will be a great pick for you.

Great premise but so slow

Like several other reviewers said, I really wanted to like this book. But it was really slow. I found myself having to force myself to pay attention. So many times I had to rewind because I had lost track of the story. Maybe it would be better if it was read instead of listened to because the reading of emails and blogs is even more tedious. Just disappointing.

Okay

It was okay. Hard to follow at first. I had to keep starting the chapters over again. It was a little frustrating.

Good story line

Being a man, I don't think I could fully empathize with the mother’s angst over a missing child. The story could be a real life mother telling her tail. Real life, meaning kind of boring, if you know what I mean. That with a lot of digression in the story line makes me rate this as meh.

Much too long

This was a pretty good story but the author needs to learn that readers are not interested in endless similes of internal thoughts of the characters

Fabulously told

The story and how it was told from a looking back perspective was very well done. Great characters and character building. I truly enjoyed every moment and would have listened straight through in one sitting if I could.

Slow, Too many Feelings, Too Much Estrogen

The author can write, but just runs on and on about everybody's feelings. Maybe a good editor could whittle it down to a quarter it's current length and produce a better book.

A mother’s instinct...

What She Knew was an emotion-grabbing, wonderfully written story with great narration. You can feel the mother’s pain and heartbreak during the story and I even shed a few tears at times.

Slow, but engaging

I have taken a break from my usual murder mysteries to try this suspense novel about a little boy who gets abducted on a normal fall outing with his "mum."
For anyone who has kids, this story is a little frightening and will make you want to hold them a little tighter with every twist and turn. The secondary plot lines keep the story moving along while the search for Ben in underway, the characters all have different backgrounds and motivations, the relationships are complicated and give this story depth and realism found in every family in modern life.
I enjoyed this book, but some of the female reader's voices were cartoonish and awkward when she wasn't narrating from the main character, however I was able to stick with it and was rewarded with a twisty dark story in the end.

Deserves more praise

I am surprised by the very negative reviews. I thought this was a very interesting book - well written and well performed As a parent, I certainly can feel for the mother and father in this book whose child has gone missing. The agony of not knowing if he was hurt, was being hurt, or had been killed is overwhelming. The author does a fine job in describing those feelings.