Linda’s Book Obsession Reviews “The Request” by David Bell, Berkley, June 2020

Linda’s Book Obsession Reviews “The Request” by David Bell, Berkley, June 2020

WOW! David Bell, Author of “The Request” has written an intense, captivating, riveting, enthralling, and suspenseful novel. The genres for this novel are a mystery, suspense, thriller, and fiction. The timeline for this story is in the present and goes to the past when it pertains to the characters or events. The author describes his dramatic characters as complex, and complicated. There are a number of characters that could be suspect in crimes. There are lies, betrayals, secrets, danger, blackmail, and murder.

I love the way that David Bell tells a story and vividly captures the descriptions of the characters, events, and the landscape. There are always twists and turns. There is always some part of the story that states, “What If…………..”, which can be so thought-provoking. I appreciate that the author describes how the use of various media can cause a misleading representation of the lifestyle and facts of one’s life and can cause complications. Also discussed are problems such as alcoholism and gaslighting.

If you look at Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook pictures of Ryan Francis, and his wife and baby, you would think he has everything. You wouldn’t see or know the terrible guilt from a tragedy that Ryan carries from his college years. It’s not until his college friend Blake confronts Ryan with a “special request” in such a persuasive manner, that Ryan becomes anxious and has a foreboding feeling.

Blake makes Ryan an offer that he can’t refuse, and Ryan finds himself going to  a woman’s house to retrieve incriminating letters. Ryan doesn’t find the letters but does find the body of the dead woman.  As Ryan hears police sirens in the near distance, his phone rings, with a Facebook request to be friends with the deceased woman.

I would highly recommend this edgy, chilling thriller for readers who love to escape in a great book.