Tell No One
Harlan Coben
ISBN: 978-0440236702
The tension and drama in Tell No One begins from the first page. Author Harlan Coben has written a gripping thriller that grabs readers and keeps them enthralled until nearly the story’s end, with a unique twist on the killer that you won’t see coming.
The story opens with a married couple, David and Elizabeth Beck, who have gone off to their family cabin in the woods to celebrate their anniversary. While skinny dipping at the lake after dark, an incident occurs that will change the course of their lives. Elizabeth is kidnapped, David is knocked out and left for dead. All this is mere prologue to the real story, however.
Eight years later, after Elizabeth’s body has been found, and the killer imprisoned for a series of murders of young women, David receives an email message from his dead wife. By now he is working as a doctor in an impoverished New York neighborhood, but he is still haunted by the loss of Elizabeth, whom he has known since childhood. At first he thinks it must be a cruel joke, but the email shakes David to his core because the email contains information so specific that no one else except his wife could have written it. And the final warning that comes in the message: Tell No One is the book’s title.
A later email arrives along with a link to a street camera, and for the first time, David thinks he sees a woman who could only be his wife. His sister’s partner, a close friend who’s familiar with the world of advertising, tries to show David that the image could have been a manipulation of videotape. Yet David will continue to pursue the clues…to their deadly end.
Along the way, both old and new plots will develop, bodies will be found at the lake house, David will be accused of murder, and a local gangsta (whose son David has been treating medically) will come to his rescue as David is pursued both by police and unknown thugs who are out to kill him. As the tension builds and bodies pile up, new clues and questions emerge. Everyone appears to be hiding something: Elizabeth, her family, her friends, and David himself.
It’s a taut, tense journey from beginning to end. At some point near the end, the story becomes so convoluted that the author loses some of his game, trying to keep all those balls in the air until the story’s end. He does it, but he weakens the plot slightly. Overall, however, it’s a gripping journey into the lies families tell each other and a great read.
