Psychothriller from Sebastian Fitzek with a captivating story of a psychologist Olivia, who is trying to find a compatible donor for her adoptive daughter but is thrown into a mysterious and dangerous history of her daughter’s family. On the other side we are introduced to Valentina, who is getting us back into the past, eleven years ago, where it all started.
As it is quite common for this author, the main character is a specialist in a usable field for the police (she has a PhD in Psychology and teaches at a university), but doesn’t work in the armed forces, secret services or the police itself. The beginning of the story is a famous dialog from social networks between a nervous girl, who is trying to order a pizza from 911 but in reality, it is a cry for help. I think, it is not the first-time a writer has taken inspiration in this dialogue. In this story it was used in a different way, but to that we will return later on in this review.
Most of author’s stories are about older cases, which come up in current times, and also how this plot starts. Olivia, the main character, is trying to figure out, who are the parents of her daughter, because she has Leukaemia and needs to find a suitable bone marrow donor. The adoption agency does not want to tell the names of Alma’s relatives, since the case is confidential and the revealing of the motherâs name can be threatening to her life. When she is leaving the agency, an older lady comes to her and tells her about the Calendar Girl. It is the first starting point into the past and the life of Valentina.
After a short period of time, we meet with Olivia’s student, Elias, thanks to whom all the drama starts. I asked myself, why would Elias help his professor, like braking into a flat to steal documents of Alma’s past or visiting a sanatorium with her, and again stealing documentation from a doctor. It was bit suspicious for me, but on the other hand, he was too young for killing and torturing 21 years ago in Valentina’s past. That disproved my theory of him being the killer⌠For me personally the story line of Valentina was more interesting, structured and the character had more to itself, then that of Olivia. She was basically there and followed her student ideas and information flow through the whole story. She would not even survive in the end without the help of her own eleven years old daughter. The torturing scenes from the past with the 24 âcalendar doorsâ in the school were a fascinating idea in a way of psychological pressure and punishment, but to be honest, I am not sure, if normal people would survive this kind of âtasksâ. The best part of the book was the revealing of the main mystery called Andrea. To a point I thought that she is kept or held in the sanatorium instead of Valentina. Uses her name and identity (meanwhile the real Valentina is already dead or hiding), breaks loose and the torturing with the calendar doors starts all over again. I would not be mad, if the story would end with a serial killer on the loose without any closure. Oh, and the part with the phone call to 911? I liked the idea, that it was not an emergency call but all a theatre to create an alibi. Brilliant.
The writer has his typical writing style, compositions and his vocabulary is more artistic compared to other authors in this genre. Because of that, if you already read few books by him, you don’t need to see his name on a cover to recognize his work. It was not my first book from his library, but I have to say, it was the best one so far. You can feel the progress he has made, mainly with the storylines. The story was well built, it was thrilling, quite unique, but bit predictable. The revealing part of Julian, Olivia’s husband, was a surprise, but you could feel, there was something behind a bush with him. Where I was disappointed, was the ending of Valentina. She deserved more to her character and time in the book, after a great build-up of her personality. Last thing I have to mention is what triggered me the most, and that was the fact, if women didn’t dig up the past, everything would be betterâŚ