NEVER ASK ME: A MUST READ!

Never ask me: Jeff Abbott

Two teens out for a morning game meet up to go to a park. Life seems usual and the weather perfect until something takes the joy out of their day and their lives. Walking down Winding Creek Trail Julia pauses and sees someone sitting on a bench. Ned complains that someone is trying to steal his critters when he realizes the figure on the bench is his mom. At first joking and asking her if she’s trying to steal his critters when shock and fear set in finding no pulse and his mom dead. Julia freezes and calls her mother Iris when two men out for a morning run hear screams , run over call 911 and things get tense from this point on. Who would kill Danielle Roberts and how would her son Ned deal with finding his mother’s body? Fear sets in and we hear alternating voices telling us how they see the events playing out.

Hearing Julia’s voice we understand her concern for Ned. Iris her mother seems sympathetic of her needs for comfort but, we hear straight from her that she hopes the romance dies out and Julia meets someone else. Her son Grant is harboring a secret and emails from someone and a great deal big money attached might turn his life upside down and confiding in no one he must handle this on his own. What did his parents do to this person? Who is the person Julia meets going to comfort Ned and why dies Ned get frightened when she tells him about him? Lies are deadly and this is just beginning.

Iris kept a journal of their journey when adopting Grant with Danielle’s help as the adoption person coordinating with authorities in Russia. Rules are different when dealing with them and questions can be asked of Danielle along the way but to the Russians: never ask me or them! Added in Kyle , Julia’s father has his own hidden secrets involving Danielle and stealing a flash drive from her house almost cost him his life after being threatened by a killer. More lies and more deceptions as we delve deeper into the journal, learn more about the adoption and hear Ned worried about having to live with his errant father and leaving his hometown.

His mother had a boyfriend did he kill her. Who wanted her gone and who was she arguing with the night before and why a third phone and who was she talking to in the park?

Told in alternating voices and hearing the fears, secrets and deceptions that each one has to bear within themselves you wonder what Grant will learn about his parents, why his father Kyle had to steal the flash drive, what about the adoption and Iris and Julia and Ned what about them?
Voices are heard and we hear Grant as he texts Danielle’s boyfriend’s son, Peter to help him with a hacking problem. He wants to find out who’s emailing him and why? How does this person know about the green tree and why was the money left there? Can he trust him?

Mike is Danielle’s boyfriend who comes to see how Julia is doing and is worried about Ned . Will she and Kyle talk to his father when he gets there about leaving Ned with him until he graduates? Ned wants no part of his father plus will she or Kyle give the eulogy?

Flashing back to when Iris and Kyle along with Danielle we’re flying to Russia to try and adopt Grant. But something odd happens that starts an unusual chain of events when Iris is threatened by an unknown women warning her to go home and no one buses her as Peter in the present assists Grant in trying to find the sender of his unusual emails and money to force him to confront his parents about a harsh truth and reality. What did they do and what did they do and what did his father do that was bad? Who attacked him and why?

Slowing and methodically each of the characters weaves his/her own story about hidden truths and lies that will be uncovered and change the course of their lives. Julia learned something about Ned and rather than confronting at first, she decides to take matters into her own hands and learns just what he was doing while playing Critters. Ned wants her out of this mix, but will she undo her damage before it’s too late? Grant tells someone about his green tree his hiding place where he found the money and he asks Peter to help find the person he calls sender that claims his parents are lying to him about something but what? Things get even more tense when Iris realize that Kyle lied about falling and that someone was behind what happened to him? Iris and Danielle were close to a point but who is the mystery person that contacted Danielle and that she was arguing with on a third phone? What about Mike was he going to marry her? What about Ned will he be able to deal with his father and leave his home and find his way either in London or Ghana? The author leaves us wondering what else are these people and you the reader to NEVER ASK US!

Told in alternating voices we hear the innermost thoughts of Iris, Kyle, Grant and Julia and a times Ned and Mike too. What did Julia think that Marland would know about her family and why get roped into helping him with his drug operation? What about Grant he trusted Mike with the emails, but will Ned suffer as a result and what about Peter will he find the sender? What was Kyle hiding that would change it all and why was  Julia worried about her father? Added in Iris is hiding something related to the adoption and who are the Butlers that threatened Danielle?

Unraveling the lies we learn that Kyle is guilty of something that gets him arrested. Did he kill Danielle and why did he have a burner phone with her number on it? Julia and Ned have a secret that could derail their lives if the police find out about Marland and their connection to his drug ring and being messengers. What about Grant and the sender who has hacked into his phone, computer and know all about his adoption and asks him to question his mother about a journal? Then We come to Danielle herself and the reason why anyone would want her gone plus the new residents that live their now the Butlers who managed to claim they saw a man that looked like Kyle in the middle of the night was Carrie Butler lying. Within the journal that Iris kept we learn about the real mother of her son and then the secrets and lies dealing with the adoption might come full circle in the present when Grant says he wants to visit where he was born.

Revenge is not always what you expect, and this plan was so well orchestrated that Iris and Kyle never saw it coming. Emails that were sent by someone she thought was dead. Threats made before the adoption to make sure she turned down Grant’s. People coming from all sides and then the past comes into the present and someone wanted both Julia and Kyle out of the picture making sure they went down for a murder in the past, a killing Danielle in the present. Plus, Marland was knifed did Julia really do it or was she framed? Lives are at stake and Danielle’s identity and job was revealed as she played along with some dangerous people and the truth about her trips to Russia are revealed. Who killed Danielle? What role did the new neighbors play and who was hiding in plain sight to make sure that the Pollitts were destroyed? An ending that ties the adoption, the present and someone’s true identity together as author Jeff Abbot turns the tables on a diabolical killer and created an ending so explosive, so unexpected and a secret that Iris would keep for ever as you the reader are wondering and asking questions about who killed Danielle, what are the roles of those close to Iris and Julia, what about Grant? As the title says understand to find out the answers to these and any questions you have read the book and NEVER ASK ME!

Fran Lewis: Just reviews