Gillian McAllister

One of the best mysteries/thrillers I've ever listened to, and I hope it's not just the reader, Lesley Sharp, and her Brit accent. Based upon the premise of a time loop as opposed to time travel (not my favorite trope by any means), the narrative begins with a murder in a quiet British suburb and ends up years prior to the event, with at least three incredible bombshells that go off subtly over intervals when the reader is relaxed and then - yikes - I almost ran off the road. Jen, Kelly, and show more Todd are seemingly as mundane a family as you could encounter - a lawyer mom, a construction worker dad, and a high school student son - and what is initially exceptional about them is only the love and attraction between the parents, unusual after twenty years of marriage. As Jen unravels the truth, her strong voice and her courage are impressive, especially as she learns to become more trusting of her own abilities and much more confident. A most engaging novel, in my top three of 2025 so far. show less

A fun, twisty suspense novel in which a woman is shocked to learn her writer husband has taken hostages in a warehouse in London. Some of the details beggared belief, but that is sort of par for the course with this kind of book. What made it worthwhile were the strong writing and characterization. I would definitely read more from McAllister when I want some good old fashioned, page-turning entertainment.

3.75 stars

I consider myself to be a Gillian McAllister fan and Caller Unknown is now one of my favourites of her books (along with How to Disappear and Wrong Place Wrong Time).

Simone flies to the US to meet up with her teenage daughter Lucy who has been at summer camp before hopefully taking up a place at RADA. Bar some temporarily lost luggage, all goes well until the morning after Simone’s first night in Texas when she wakes up to find Lucy gone and a phone in her place. Lucy has been abducted show more and from that moment Simone’s only purpose is to get her back. Her husband, Damien, is back home in London but even if he was in Texas, it would still be Simone who would be following orders not to contact the police, complying with the abductor’s demands, and doing all she could to save Lucy.

Some reviewers have said a suspension of disbelief was required when reading this book but of course that is the case as who can really imagine being in Simone’s situation? It doesn’t happen very often but it does happen sometimes. What shone through from start to finish is what parents, and mothers in particular, will do for their child, the hoops they will jump through, the laws they will consider breaking and the sacrifices they will make, all to keep their child safe. McAllister, in Caller Unknown, writes what she does best: a psychological thriller with moral dilemmas scattered throughout and a love story, not only between wife and husband, but in this case, even more powerfully, between mother and child.

I found this book very hard to put down. It’s pacy and full of cliffhangers (good ones that lead into the next chapter rather than leaving you hanging for longer) and it’s exciting, edge of your seat, ‘one more chapter’ brilliant. The plot is so well executed and there are so many passages of wisdom about family life that I wish I had marked them all to come back to and read again. This is such a fantastic book. show less

I'm a sucker for time travel even though I'm not generally a speculative fiction fan. I found this book very imaginative! While I'd describe this as a premise driven book, neither character development nor plot suffered...both were strong as well. And the plot kept me guessing....especially about Kelly's real role and identity.

Yes, this was a book about time travel, and a murder mystery, but it was also a story about parenting and what we would do to protect our children. It's a bout the show more guilt of being a working mother. It's about the common desire to get a "do over"...and how much our lives would differ if we'd made different choices.

I especially liked the ending where the main character forgot she had gone back in time -- forgot that her life had ever been different. I felt this made the story universal...it could happen to anyone. Maybe it already has? show less