Review: Don't You Cry by Cass Green

Title: Don't You Cry

Author: Cass Green
Publisher: HarperCollins

Publishing Date: September 6th, 2018

Pages: 336
Genre: Psychological Thriller

Series:  Standalone
Source:  Audio

 

One stolen baby. Two desperate strangers. One night of terror.
The USA Today and Sunday Times top ten bestselling author returns with a dark and twisty psychological thriller.
She saved your life.
When Nina almost dies during a disastrous blind date, her life is saved by a waitress called Angel. But later that evening, Nina is surprised by a knock on the door. It’s Angel – and she’s pointing a gun at her.
Now she’ll make you pay.
Minutes later, Angel’s younger brother Lucas turns up, covered in blood shielding a stolen newborn baby in his arms. Nina is about to endure the longest night of her life – a night that will be filled with terror and lead her to take risks she would never have believed herself capable of…

Another find searching around audible. I am really in the psychological thrillers right now and I don’t know many authors on the adult side. I have been poking around audible and just grabbing what sounds good. I saw this one, read the summary, and thought, well this sounds pretty crazy. So I grabbed it. This book was a really good read. I struggled with the rating and my thoughts just a tad. I liked the book and I enjoyed the book but it wasn’t quite the terror I was looking for. I did like the characters, I did very much like the story, I was just never on the edge of my seat. The premise was believable and I did like the touch of noir in the story. I think many times psychological thrillers have some noir in them and I do love these kinds of reads. All in all a very good and satisfying read.

Mina is in a bit of rut, she is recently divorced, her ex-husband has moved in rather quickly with a younger woman, her son is going out of the country for a vacation leaving her alone, she is truly in a rut. She goes on a blind date, almost chokes, meets a woman that saves her life. In this same night, she is alone in her house, drinking watching television, knock at the door. There is a woman that comes inside, later joined by a man and an infant child. This horrible night went from annoying to horrid fast as she is held hostage in her own home with a crazy woman, a man that may have murdered someone, and a child that has clearly been kidnapped. She must find a way to keep the baby and herself safe and escape if at all possible. 

I am pretty sure there wasn’t that much original in this story, but it felt like an original story to me. I have a hard time reading books that stick out when I read for 80 percent of my day. Maybe a little less but I do a lot of reading. I tend to stick to any kind of thriller more than any other read. So finding one in thrillers whether it be psychological, horror, mystery, or crime, I feel that they all kind of run together. I think this one may stick out in my mind for a while. This one was pretty much one night throughout most of the book. Close to the end, the timeline spans to a couple of weeks later… but for the most, part everything happened in one night. It was slow but not boring. In this night we go from learning Mina’s story to learning the story of those that hold her hostage, and the story of the night everything went down. A lot of story going on there.

The story is told from all three pov’s Mina, and her two captors. We learn a little bit about each character and the lives they have lived. As the stories contine to be told in bits and pieces, the bad guys don’t seem so bad anymore. There is a connection made, not just between the reader an the characters, but the characters in the story. By the morning, Mina knows it all and at this point, she doesn’t know what to belive but she knows she must do something. She wants to help the baby. The baby is her main objective. So the past is very relavent in this story… as in my psychological thrillers.

I really enjoyed getting to know each and every character. Mina was a very storng character. I really liked her. At first glance, she does come across as a bit of a whiner. She just recently lost her husband to a younger girl, her son is going away for a trip, she feels pity for herself in a major way. All this changes when the strangers come into her home with a kidnapped infant. This changes everything for Mina and the mama bear protector comes out. She isn’t a force in any physical means, but she knows how to figure these two crazy people out and start to use her mind to get something done. The entire time she never loses focus and stays strong.

There are many layers to this story and yes the underlying story isn’t much differnet from many stories about damaged people, the way it was told, the setting in which it took place, the charcters, the timeline. All if it together makes an uforgettable story. No, I wasn’t on the edge if my seat, but I was fully vested and I just couln’t put the book down.

I truly enjoyed this book and was on the edge of my seat with this read. 

Cass Green is the pseudonym of Caroline Green, an award-winning author of fiction for young people. Her first novel, Dark Ride won the Rona Young Adult Book of the Year and the Waverton Good Read Award. Cracks and Hold Your Breath garnered rave reviews and were shortlisted for eleven awards between them. She is the Writer in Residence at East Barnet School and teaches Writing for Children at City University. The Woman Next Door is her first novel for adults.