Published June 2nd 2011 by Decadent Publishing Company
Some crimes can never be forgotten...
Kate Evans doesn’t take risks. She chose her apartment with care—a safe district with a good neighbor—a place where she can live a quiet, unassuming, under-the-radar existence. Then she makes one mistake and opens her door to accept a delivery of flowers from a secret admirer and her life will never be the same again. A guy she’s never seen before bursts into her apartment and asks her to marry him. Jack Thompson won’t take no for an answer and drags Kate on a cross country journey to hell.
Invalided out of the police, Nathan Beranson works as a private investigator in San Antonio, Texas where he spends too much of his time following unfaithful spouses and delivering the bad news to their partners. When his fiancée cheats on him with Jack Thompson, the half-brother Nathan’s only just met, he becomes obsessed with Jack in the same unhealthy way as his revenge-seeking clients. By the time Nathan finally realizes putting the ghosts of the past to rest is a wiser option than settling an old score, it’s too late. He’s already been drawn into his sibling’s latest deadly game and Nathan and Kate find their nightmare is only just beginning.
Arlene's Thoughts
Brutal, horrifying, disturbing yet absolutely riveting!!! Chosen scarred me in the worst way. I think I need to get some bleach to rid the images and story from my brain. Never, have I EVER been so disturbed by a novel, and I just want my mental frenzy to simply quiet down. I’m an absolute mess!
Barbara Elsborg deserves a standing ovation for this flawless portrayal of a psychotic sociopath gone wild. Thriller novels are by no means my genre of choice, but I’m a huge fan of Elsborg, so when my reading buddy presented this book with phenomenal ratings to me as our next read, I thought… Why not???
Well let me tell you... It’s freakin’ insane and disturbing and horrifying and awful... That’s why!
In Chosen, Kate is abducted from what she thought was her safe haven by Jack the psycho. She quickly learns that her life has taken a deadly turn when her stalker begins to execute his well laid out plan of making her his wife and forcing her to live with him in a secluded cabin. What ensues are killings, kidnappings, beatings, torture and more awful things I don’t want to think about any more.
This novel had a constant momentum of awful to worse feeling. The twists and turns made my head hurt and my stomach flip. There was absolutely no reprieve for Kate and as much as I rooted her on and appreciated her constant fight to escape and survive, there were moments I wanted him to just put her out of her misery.
I don’t like to read torture scenes, and I especially hate books that have violence towards women, so I’m justifying my higher rating not because I enjoyed it... I promise... I did NOT enjoy this book for one moment, but because Elsborg is a bold author with genius writing. The story telling alone is what makes me rate this higher than a normally would.
This book is disturbing and I don’t recommend it. There was a point in time when I thought I was flawed because I’ve once... or twice fallen for fictional characters that were dangerous and twisted. Well this book proves even I have my limits. I just wanted Jack to die a slow horrible death. He crossed my limit on page ONE!
Did I mention this book is disturbing? Yeah, I TRULY mean it... ~nods vigorously~
4 Suns
Kate oh my where do I even start. Kate has had a rough life and just when she thinks she might be able to breathe the worst happens. She is kidnapped by a psychotic man and each day spent in his presence is worse than the day before.
I have to agree with my reading buddy normally I sit and wait for the kidnapper to have some redeeming qualities. They ALWAYS turn out to be a damaged soul who turns around at the last second and helps the victim. Yes I know that this isn't great either but what can I say I like the damaged ones. Jack NEVER redeems himself. I knew from his first intro that he wasn't going to be the norm and I hate to say I was right but yep he was horrible!
I have never wanted to castrate a character before, but if I could have reached into the book and maimed him I would have. I honestly finished this book just to see if he met some kind of horrible death. I won't say if he did but I appreciated what the author did and I have to give her major props for making me feel such hate. It definitely takes a lot to evoke that kind of emotion from me and well I honestly hate Jack with every fiber of my being. He did so many horrible things and one thing in particular had me almost in tears with anger. I don't normally read this type of book and I wish I had known certain things going in because I think it would have swayed me away from reading it.
That all being said Elsborg definitely deserves major credit. Her writing was outstanding and even though I didn't enjoy this book I still want to read more from her. Her characters really made me feel something and I am excited to read something where I love the characters to see if I will feel the same intensity I do for love as I did for hate.
One more thing the ending kinda threw me. For such a harsh book I didn't expect what the epilogue brought. I don't think certain events would be swept under the rug like they were and life would not be normal. I would have liked a more realistic epilogue and that's why I didn't give this 4 stars.
3 Suns
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