‘The Chain’ is sure to keep readers shackled to their recliners
“The Chain” by Adrian McKinty (Mulholland Books, 357 pages, $28).
Adrian McKinty has written the scariest book of the year.
In “The Chain,” McKinty plumbs our deepest fears. This is the kind of book that will give readers nightmares because McKinty shows us how a simple twist of fate can transform ordinary people into monsters. People just like us.
Here’s his premise: a family could be living peacefully in Anytown, USA when suddenly their comfortable suburban existence is shattered after one of their children fails to come home from school. As soon as they are starting to realize that something is wrong and they are on the verge of filing a police report, the phone rings; it is a kidnapper calling with a ransom request.
That’s only the beginning of their bad dreams. This kidnapper is quite desperate, because somebody else is currently holding one of their own children hostage, too. That’s the essence of The Chain — paying the ransom doesn’t free your child. After you have paid it you will be informed that you’ll have to go out and abduct another child if you want your own child to be safely released. You have become yet another quivering link in The Chain.
That is how this kidnapping chain thrives and proliferates. And if you report what is going on to the police you’ll never see your child again. This is how ordinary law-abiding citizens get sucked into a diabolical web that transforms them into criminals who are sworn to secrecy. They know if they revealed the truth the people managing this operation will come and kill them.
The masterminds behind this self-perpetuating extortion plot are raking in the cash. The warped genius of their evil strategy shields them from detection. Most of the dirty work is being undertaken by the innocent people they are manipulating.
If you are one of the unfortunates who has been turned into a kidnapper so that you could rescue your own child, then you will realize that even after your loved one has been safely returned you’ll remain under surveillance. The people running The Chain have hacked into your computers and mobile devices. They’ll never stop watching you.
Someone who was drawn into this mess takes action: Rachel wants to determine who is behind this organization. It won’t be easy; they have safeguards in place to prevent our protagonist from infiltrating or exposing them: “Every choice she has is a bad one. Action is bad. Inaction is bad. … You have parachuted into a minefield and there is no safe way out. Maybe this is how The Chain tests people, by sending someone out as bait for potential defectors? Any person in here could be The Chain’s agent.”
McKinty’s series of Sean Duffy detective novels set during the period of “The Troubles” in Northern Ireland are among my all-time favorites. In “The Chain,” McKinty has written a standalone thriller that will win him many new readers. The book is so hot it got optioned by Hollywood for film development before it was even published.