Book Review: The Request | David Bell

When a man agrees to do a favor for a friend, he gets more than he bargained for as he becomes embroiled in a woman’s murder in this new thriller from the USA Today bestselling author of Layover.

Fast-paced, intricate, and with some great twists—if you don’t mind suspending your disbelief a tad, grab David Bell’s latest thriller The Request and clear your plans for the next day! This one is hard to put down once you start it!

About the Book

It all started with blackmail. Well, that’s not entirely true. It all started with the accident back in college. The secret that Ryan and his best friend Blake have held onto for so long. The guilt over a sophomoric prank gone wrong. Now someone is blackmailing Ryan, and it is only the beginning…

Ryan has the picture-perfect life. Literally. His photos of his wife Amanda and their infant son Henry gather hundreds of likes and comments from friends and family. Ryan has finally overcome his troubling past—the loss of his father, the struggles to make ends meet and finish his degree, the accident… Now he is married, has a job he is great at, has a beautiful son, and is even a minority owner in a local bar.

When his best friend from college Blake gets together with him, everything will change. First the blackmail, and now Blake reappears. Despite the setbacks, Ryan and Blake always are bonded. So when Blake approaches Ryan with the good news that he and his on-again-off-again  girlfriend Samantha are getting married, Ryan is taken aback but happy for them. Sam is so good for Blake.

Now Blake has just one small request from Ryan, that will change everything…

Go to the house of a woman he was seeing on a break with Sam, and look for some letters. The letters will not just destroy what Blake has with Sam, he also confesses about the accident from college. The one Ryan is being blackmailed about. So Ryan goes, against his better judgment. And when he gets these, things really take a turn… Because Ryan knows this woman, and now he finds her murdered in her home.

He was never supposed to be there, so he runs. And then things really unravel. Who is setting him up for murder? Did Blake know about this? And is this death linked to the blackmail, or just a coincidence?

Reflection

Moving at breakneck speed from the moment it begins, this is a fantastic book to lose yourself in. For my personal tastes, this is by far the best book of David Bell’s that I’ve read. The narrative structure and the cliff hangers at the end of the chapters definitely has me hooked. It is a total “one more chapter” kind of read!

Ryan is a great character, because he is rootable but flawed. I really wanted things to turn out okay. I loved his family. I really liked Amanda and found her to be quite intriguing as a character. From the beginning social media has a subtle but important current underlying the narrative. Ryan notes several times how much he puts on display. And at times we hear from different characters whether they do or don’t use social media. We also learn how many see the perfect photos of Ryan’s family and think it means his life is perfect. Let me tell you—it is clear from page one that his life isn’t perfect! But that is always the thing about social media, right? We only put the good things out there.

Ryan also harbors guilt over the night from college, and it is hard to not want to reach through the pages and shake him. Just come clean! Stop lying to Amanda! And then there were moments I wanted to say the same to her. But through all of their ups and downs as characters, I loved the way both drop everything for one another. That sort of love can get you through even the roughest times. And let’s just say, this book covers the roughest of times for them!

Twist-y and addictive—this is a great thriller to dive into!

Thank you to Berkley Publishing for my copy. Opinions are my own.