Member Reviews
Abduction is a great thriller with a good twist at the end of the book. The characters and storyline are well developed. The writing is good.
Thank you for the opportunity to read this book and I really enjoyed it. It is very well written and I loved how it had been set out. The detail of the story and the procedures are amazing. Fully recommend this book. Amazing! Start to end
The premise of this book sounded fantastic. I struggled with the writing. It was a bit confusing. I had to go back a few times to see the chapter headers to see who was talking. It was a bit frustrating.
That was disappointing because the story itself was quite good.
Elise cannot believe her eyes. Standing just feet away from her in a local shopping mall is the image of her sister, missing 14 years. She knows deep down it is her! She follows the young woman making it look accidental when she bumps into her and starts a conversation. The young woman we find out is named Jane Solomon.
Convinced she has found her missing sister, Elise, now in her 20's, married, and pregnant...contacts local law enforcement to reopen the investigation.
14 YEARS PRIOR
It is Grace's birthday and family and friends gather at Lilac House to celebrate. While in the middle of a game, little Grace goes missing. She is never found.
Meanwhile, Grace cannot remember anything about that day, her family, etc. As the story develops, Margaret, Grace/Elise's mother does everything in her power to help her daughter remember but still she cannot recall anything. It is not until local family the Solomon's are arrested for her kidnapping that Grace realizes who she really is. Her "father" almost immediately suffers a heart attack and dies and her "mother" Elizabeth has gone all but mute and is not speaking about the incident. Grace then must learn the truth on her own.
The family decides to revisit Lilac House, now owned by a new family, to see if any of her memories can be triggered. While there, Grace suffers a flashback that provides her all of the answers she is looking for.
Who was behind the kidnapping? The truth will leave you speechless
This book kept me on the edge of my seat! Another wonderful thriller by Gillian Jackson. Great character development and a very surprise ending.
#Abduction # Netgalley
I enjoyed this book, however I do think it was predictable. When Grace went missing at the age of 3. Although 12 years later. Elsie was 9 when her sister disappeared. She saw someone who she was convinced was Grace. After Elise phoned the Family liaison officer who checked out. This girl who was the daughter of a doctor. After production of her birth certificate, of his daughter. It looks like it’s alk eventually over now. Time to accept Grace is no longer coming home
I enjoyed the overall story- I did guess the twist at the end. Likeable characters and well written. I did, however, find it a little repetitive and there were way too many exclamation marks through the book. I would read more from this author.
Thank you to netgalley for the free digital copy.
Review for 'Abduction' by Gillian Jackson
Available to read and review on NetGalley
An absolutely fantastic page turner. This book was very well written and kept me questioning myself throughout. Loved the twist. Very strong and likeable characters. An excellent suspense /mystery/thriller which I highly recommend to fans of this genre. I thouroughly enjoyed and was disappointed to come to the end so quickly. I will definitely be looking out for more books by this author!!
Rated 5/5 on Goodreads.
I really liked this and read it quickly. Elise’s little sister goes missing, everyone assumes she’s dead. But Elise never gives up hope and when she thinks she see’s her years later she won’t let it drop! Is it actually Grace though?
Really well written, if you like psychological thrillers then you’ll love this book!
I can’t say I really loved this one. After a 2 year old disappeared at a birthday party, many years later her sister runs into her in a department store. After that, the story decends into chaos. I just didn’t find it very believable and it moved slowly at parts.
Grace disappears at her 3rd Birthday party. Who has taken her nobody knows.
14 years later her sister Elise is in a department store when she spots a girl with a striking resemblance to grace. She just can’t go over and ask are you grace . Elise is pregnant so she pretends she’s not well and the girl helps her. Elise is 100% sure this is Grace.
At home she tells her husband, auntie & uncle but they put it down to her hormones.Elise is not giving up she gets in touch with Jack who was on the case and she tells him all she has learnt about the girl.
Jack decides to visit this Doctor and his wife to put Elise’s mind to rest. The doctor shows him a birth certificate and photos of the young girl. Jack believes the girl is there daughter. After Jack has visited them things start to escalate they find out they have put their house up for sale. They get a warrant to search the house but when they get there it’s empty. They have taken off. A nationwide alert is put in place . Eventually Grace is found but the doctor is dead and they take the wife to a mental hospital. The D.N.A matches this is Grace she is the daughter & sister missing for 14 years.
Why was she taken ?
Jack is sure somebody helped them but who ?
Thanks Netgalley
What an emotional roller coaster! Such a page turner, so full of tension and stress! This is so fantastically written that you get everyone’s side of it. Great idea! Thank you for writing such a great book Gillian!
Thank you to NetGalley, Gillian Jackson and Sapere Books for this ARC.
I liked the plot line, but found the writing lacking. The story feels like it's being told as an incident report, not as a novel.
I was so looking forward to reading this after such an exciting synopsis but I've been left feeling a little deflated.
The actual storyline was interesting and intriguing at times but I found the writing style quite heavy handed and a lot of the plot points seemed 'convenient'
I felt the main parts where the build up and real detailing is needed were rushed through, where as the minor details are explained in too much detail.
I enjoyed the fact that the story was told from every angle, each character had a say so you got to see the whole story unfold and it helped answer those questions going through your own mind ... "how would I feel if that was my child", "how does the child feel, does she not remember" etc
The book is well written (excusing the grammer) and the characters, emotions and locations are put across really well, the main characters are definitely likeable.
I was disappointed that for me it wasnt a gripping, heart pounding, page turning thriller that I expected but it's worth a read.
From what I've read this is a self published book but it's in dire need of some editing! Too many grammar mistakes that sadly take away from the story.
Thank you to netgalley for the ARC.
2.5* from me.
Firstly a huge thank you to Netgalley for this arc!
An interesting read for sure! I drew some similarities to the Madeleine McCann case as the child was the same age, blonde and vanished into thin air.
I had my problems with it too though, I don’t like the repetition of events but from different characters POVs it felt unnecessary
There were also a few americanisms here and there such as ‘the school was a few blocks away’ even though the story is set in the UK...
I also remember whilst reading thinking there is no way any of this would have gotten this far without DNA confirmation, you don’t just assume that because it looks and lines up a certain way that this is legit 🙄
This really unsettled me as the mother of a 2 year old girl, I doubt I’ll be sleeping much tonight 😂
Other than that a good page turner
2 stars. A child is abducted and a family never truly recovers. Grace’s sister thinks she sees her in public 14 years later. Is it Grace? Is it possible to run into you ur missing sibling at random?
The story follows the family before the abduction, after the abduction and current. Overall I think the story was dry and fairly predictable. No major plot twists until the very end, and the ending left much to be desired. After this, I can say I will not be reading another book about child abduction anytime soon. I only finished the book to see how it ended.
Special thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for the ARC in exchange for an honest review.
I feel bad whenever I give 3 or less star review. As someone who in her writing years always wanted to have her work published I’m aware that negative views can sting. I apologize in advance to Ms. Jackson who I’m sure worked quite hard on this novel.
Positives are the way characters were written; I felt I knew them personally. I even wept several times having been in closely related situations as two of the main characters. I wanted to reach into the book and hug them all, especially Jack who goes above and beyond his job requirements to discover what’s happened to Grace. I connected to all involved.
Descriptions of people, places, emotions, and the like were all wonderfully and realistically written. That alone made this worth reading.
At first the story was intriguing but certainly not gripping or pulse pounding. I’m not sure I would call it a thriller, more like a domestic noir. It is written in perspective style, each chapter from a different character POV. A style that seems to be trending right now and sometimes works out quite nicely but not in this book.
Each POV was a repeat of the other POVs with a few personal thoughts to reflect the respective character. This created a redundancy that became quite tiresome.
Somewhere around the halfway point it felt like Jackson lost track of the plot and aimlessly wrote several chapters that seemed of little to no relevance. It was at this point in which everything started to just drag along slowly for about another quarter. By the last quarter I found myself just skimming pages to get the gist of the conclusion.
There were many places in which the chapters greatly differed and it was those where I found my interest highest. However, overall it was a long tedious read for me. I believe Jackson is a great writer but there was just too much repetition of several story incidents.
Thank you to NetGalley and the publishers for granting me the opportunity to read this book. I look forward to future reviewing.
First off, I definitely DID enjoy speeding through this book-and to that it was certainly a page turner and quick read that kept me interested.
My main criticism as someone who usually HATES too much character development, was ironically, I thought the characters could have actually used MORE.
I felt we just dove into somehow supposedly rooting for Elise finding her sister (which don’t get me wrong, I certainly was as I have three small kids of my own— the whole concept of this story is terrifying and deplorable—taking your mind down far too many rabbit holes) instead of knowing her, being drawn to her, and then consequently rooting for her.
In that respect the character development felt a bit rushed, but as I said, I’m the sort of person who would rather err on the side of questioning IF there was ENOUGH character development, rather than reading pages upon pages of too much!
And as for the conclusion wrapped nicely in a bow—-it was-somewhat to my dismay for this cynical reading mind, but I’m satisfied it did....even if I MAY have partway through guessed, despite the couple of red herrings thrown in throughout to take me off the scent!
Entertaining, yet cringeworthy plot line that will make you kiss your kiddos...because if they’re not safe in their own backyard, where are they?
Now I need whiskey and a kiddo snuggle...and to raise my children in a bubble....Bubbleboy anyone?!
IG handle: Janicedoesbooks
Really enjoyed this. I'm a huge fan of books with different perspectives and this was really well executed. Even when the main premise of the story was resolved half way through, I still wanted to keep reading!
Elise is pregnant. She will have a baby boy in about 6 weeks. She is more than thrilled. What would have put the icing on the cake is if her sister Grace was there to enjoy the birth of her nephew. Grace was abducted on her third birthday. 13 years later and nothing has been resolved of the case. She has never been found dead or alive.
As Elise is shopping at the mall, she looks up and sees her sister! She knows that's her. When she calls the young girl Grace, the young girl says that that is not her name. Feigning illness the young girl helps Elise to a chair and stays to make sure she is ok. The resemblance to her sister is remarkable. Elise knows her sister, even though it has been years, she knows this is her.
It is time to let the police know.
A remarkable and poignant story of child abduction and the aftermath of coming to terms of the reality of the child having a whole new identity.
Well written, excellent characters.