Annabel Lee
Coffey & Hill #1
by Mike Nappa

My rating: 4.5 / 5
Genre: Thriller/suspense, Christian

When an eleven-year-old girl is hidden in an underground bunker by her uncle and told to not open the door for even him, unless he gives her the secret passcode, she doesn’t know why she’s there or how long she might be alone in the room with only a guard dog as company. Private investigators Trudi Coffey and Samuel Hill are turned onto the hunt for something secret and hidden, never expecting it to be a human being.

This book hooked me from the beginning and didn’t let up. It was fast-paced, suspenseful, and intriguing with some well-developed characters. I particularly like the bond that forms between two of those characters, though I think it’d be a spoiler to say who they are. It’s not Coffey and Hill, though, not because they aren’t good characters and good partners, but they were once married and are now divorced. And though the book seems to be leading toward a possible future reconciliation, at least as partners (they were also partners in a private investigation business when they were married), I could take or leave a reconciliation of romance, because one particular thing that Samuel did while they were married is something I know I could never get over. If Trudi can in a future book, good for her.

The book is told from three perspectives: Trudi Coffey’s and a mysterious ex-Special Forces man called The Mute’s are in 3rd person, past tense, and then there’s Annabel Lee (the 11-year-old girl), whose perspective is in 1st person, present tense. Normally this kind of changing between tenses and POV types bothers me, but I found that I didn’t mind it in this book. I suppose an author’s style can really affect how well it works. There was something about the writing that reminded me a lot of Frank Peretti or (early) Ted Dekker books I’ve enjoyed. I would not call this a Christian-genre book, exactly, but more like a book written with a Christian worldview, as Trudi had become a Christian in the years before the story and tries to filter her life through that newish lens. On the other hand, there are some really brutal and gory fight scenes in and around the climax. It got to be just a bit too much for me, which is the reason for the half-star detraction. Outside of that, I loved this book and recommend it to fans of suspense and thriller novels, especially with a Christian leaning.

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