Hostage

This is my second hostage-scenario book this summer. I wanted to read Hostage as soon as it came out but after reading (and loving!) Falling by T.J Newman earlier this summer, I decided to wait a bit to read this book. Cleanse my palate with some other genres and themes, if you will. I'm happy to say both books blew me away and also made me rethink booking my post-Covid flight for quite awhile!

Clare Mackintosh is one of my auto-read authors and Hostage fits the bill for her signature thriller reads. Told with two POVs - Mina a flight attendant on an inaugural 20-hour non-stop flight from London to Sydney and her police detective husband Adam who is on the ground with their special needs daughter, Sophia. 

Equal attention is given to both POVs, each with their own suspense and different issues. The locked room setting for Mina ups the tension and claustrophobic feel for the reader and I appreciated how Mackintosh gives readers snippets of background on several of the passengers, giving readers a few suspects for the terrorists. Adam also holds his own. He has his hands full caring for their daughter, as well as dealing with secrets and threats.

Within these two vastly different settings, Mackintosh has created a hard-to-put-down, addictive read that has action, twists, familial angst, and important societal messages. The tension wavers a bit in the middle but then escalates to a fever pitch towards the end so readers should be prepared for this book to take precedence over their lives until they've turned the final pages. 

Buckle up, my bookish friends and be prepared to be taken hostage by this gripping, heart-pounding read and its fantastic, twisty ending.

My Rating: 4.5 stars

Author: Clare Mackintosh

Genre: Suspense

Type and Source: Hardcover from public library

Publisher: Sourcebooks Landmark

First Published: June 22, 2021

Opening Line: "Stop that, you'll fall."

Book Description from GoodReads: You can save hundreds of lives. Or the one that matters most.

A claustrophobic thriller set over twenty hours on one airplane flight, with the heart-stopping tension of The Last Flight and the wrenching emotional intensity of Room, Hostage takes us on board the inaugural nonstop flight from London to Sydney.

Mina is trying to focus on her job as a flight attendant, not the problems of her five-year-old daughter back home, or the fissures in her marriage. But the plane has barely taken off when Mina receives a chilling note from an anonymous passenger, someone intent on ensuring the plane never reaches its destination. Someone who needs Mina's assistance and who knows exactly how to make her comply.

It's twenty hours to landing. A lot can happen in twenty hours.