I have announced that I’m cutting back on my reading of thrillers, just because I’m getting too old for the stress. But that doesn’t mean I’ve given up on thrillers altogether. When I do read one, I prefer the smaller, more intimate kind, where the focus is as much on character as on bangs and kabooms.
Which is precisely what I found in Steve Frech’s No Turning Back. I got it through an online deal, knowing nothing about the author or the story. But I had a treat in store.
Our hero and narrator (the book, I regret to say, is written in the present tense) is Lucas Walker, a young man who moved with his wife Julia to Los Angeles from their small home town in Pennsylvania not long ago. They found the streets meaner than they expected, but they were getting by when they learned that Julia was pregnant. They agreed they wanted the baby, and somehow they’d figure out a way to pay for it. Then Lucas lost his job. Concerned about stressing Julia, he did not tell her about this. Instead, when he’s not job-hunting, he now drives for a ride share service. It doesn’t help to pay their debts, but it allows him to maintain insurance coverage.
Lucas thinks he’s in a bad spot.
But he has no idea how bad a spot can be.
When he picks up a man named Damon, on a dark road in the Hollywood Hills, he figures he can squeeze one more ride into his night. Maybe he’ll get a decent tip.
Instead, Damon – who is spattered in blood – pulls a gun on him and tells him to drive to a certain address. There he will kill someone, and then they will drive to another address where he’ll kill someone else. He has a whole night of homicide planned out, and Lucas will be his chauffeur.
If Lucas does not cooperate, Damon says, he will kill him. Then he will go to his apartment and kill Julia.
Over the course of the night, Lucas will learn what fear and desperation really are. But he will also discover courage and resource within himself that he never knew he had.
And he will learn a few things about Damon – who is not exactly what he seems, and somehow grows increasingly sympathetic, in spite of the blood on his hands.
No Turning Back is fast, intense, and compelling. It grabbed me like the best work of Andrew Klavan or Gregg Hurwitz. It also had a very satisfying twist at the end. This is an expertly plotted and written story. It would make a great movie. Like all thrillers, it contains a few implausibilities, but they’re well handled.
I happily recommend No Turning Back. Cautions for language, violence, and adult themes.