Hello beautiful people!! Welcome to a new review! For this review, I get into The Whisper Man by Alex North an eerie mystery thriller that follows a family haunted by the past and finding even more trouble in the future. I really enjoyed the book and found it to be a good spooky read. There were a few times when I definitely got goosebumps, so let’s get into it!
Main Characters:
- Tom Kennedy: Lost his wife suddenly and is left to raise their young son Jake alone, moves his little family to what he hopes will be a fresh start but finds that this fresh start may be more rotten than they could have ever imagined
- Jake Kennedy: Is struggling with the loss of his mother and is presenting it in odd ways, has an imaginary friend who is this creepy little girl who tells him weird things, finds that this new town they move to may be out to get him
- Frank Carter: Committed a bunch of murders of little boys in Featherbank years before Tom and Jake move there, even though he is locked away some things start happening that may be connected to him
- Pete Willis: A detective who put Frank Carter away years ago, is pulled back into the mystery when a boy goes missing and is found in the same fashion that Frank killed his victims
My Review
The Whisper Man by Alex North is the second book of his I have read. I read The Shadows last year and didn’t love it but didn’t hate it. I didn’t go into The Whisper Man with any ideas about the book and found that I enjoyed it a lot more. I think both books are great, and honestly, they have a bit of a similar vibe, but personally, I enjoyed The Whisper Man a lot more. I think it was the characters in this one that I liked better, I think they were just a bit stronger which of course built for a better telling of the mystery. I also preferred the way this book ended as opposed to The Shadows.
I gave The Whisper Man an 8.5/10 rating. I was a bit skeptical that I was going to like the book in the first bit, but it really started to pick up, and once it did it was hard to put the book down. The book starts off with Tom giving us a back story as to how it just ended up being him and Jake. One day his wife fell ill and simply passed. There was no warning and no way to stop it. Not only this but their young son Jake was the one to find her dead in their home. Even before this mother’s passing Jake was a bit of an odd kid, often keeping to himself, drawing lots, saying and doing some weird things, but it amps up a bit after she’s gone. Tom while putting in some effort to try and support his son, is struggling a lot on his own and isn’t pulling through for his son in the ways he wants to. After some things happen at school, and in their old home Tom decides is time for them to get a fresh start in a new town called Featherbank. What the two don’t know is that the town has a pretty dark history in which many years ago Frank Carter left his mark by murdering young boys and dumping their bodies sometime later after kidnapping them. Detective Pete Willis is brought back into Franks’ world when in the present a young boy goes missing and when he is found dead the M.O. is eerily similar to that of Franks that he used all that time ago. Pete is left to wonder if a copycat is on the loose or if Frank had a partner all along. Things further pick up when it seems that whoever got the most recent boy maybe after Jake.
While this is definitely a book that revolves around a creepy mystery with even creepier people, I found that it really revolved a lot around the relationship between Tom and Jake, and Tom finding his confidence in being a single father. Don’t get me wrong there is this spine-tingling plot at the heart of it all in which in the past Frank Carter whispers to young boys at their windows to lure them to him ultimately taking their lives, and in the present, it starts happening again but Frank is locked away so who could it be, and why? But really though this kind of ends up being just a very intense vessel for Tom and Jake to test their relationship and see what it means for it to just be the two of them. Tom is also forced to question the ways that he may pre-judge or not see his son’s perspective on things. Jake is a really interesting kid and I honestly connected to him a lot throughout the book, especially the school scenes. There’s a part of him that wants to fit in and have friends but when he talks he always feels like he says the wrong thing. Due to this, he ends up mostly just keeping to himself. I will say though that I never had any creepy little girl imaginary friends. Doing what I do for work I thought early on that this may be just a way that he’s dealing with his mother’s death, but it seems like the friend may have been around before she passed, but if anything maybe him spending time with the imaginary friend just got more intense after she passed.
I also found myself really pulled in by Tom’s character and interested to see how he would handle different things throughout the book. He’s a bit oblivious, but overall he’s a good guy who’s just trying to put on a brave face for his son, even though he wishes he could crumble. It seems like Tom’s connection to his wife is deep, and her loss has been really difficult for him. There’s also a part of him that blames himself because he didn’t realize how sick she really was before it was too late. This translates a bit into how he functions with his son in which he partly treats him like he’s made of glass, but is also a bit fearful of how much he loves him. Love hurts and at this point, he knows that better than anyone. I thought the way that Tom and Jake get pulled into this mystery was really interesting. Without giving too much away something about this town is connected to them and that’s why when they move there Jake is being watched by the Whisper Man 2.0 even though they really haven’t been there long. I thought that this connection was well spun into the book and while there were a few times I questioned where the hell it was going, it eventually got there.
I enjoyed the way this intense mystery is spun into the world of this broken-hearted family. It just made for a really eerie book and one where you’re obviously rooting for Tom and Jake but know that this chaos is just bound to continue coming as the book goes on. Frank Carter’s nasty self at the center of it all also made it so this book just had this spooky tone throughout. If you love a good character-centered mystery thriller I would definitely recommend checking this one out.
*** Don’t go any further if you don’t want to see any spoilers***
Alright let’s get into how Jake and Tom are connected to the town, and whether Frank Carter’s had a copycat or a partner who was never caught.
There turns out to be a few connections. The reason that Jake is so driven to the house they move into is because he saw a photo of his mother as a girl standing outside of it. Not understanding that she was standing in front of a haunted house he just wanted to be somewhere close to his mother. His mother grew up in Featherbank and while not growing up at the house clearly spent some time there. What he didn’t know further is that the house had this history to it that even the woman who sold it to them never could have guessed. Before she sold it some other people stayed there over time and after some weird things happen Tom finds some old bones in the garage. Turns out that Jake was more targeted because of what was at the house and him being a young boy and not so much for any particular reason doing with them.
So it turns out that Frank never had a partner, but it’s a bit more complicated than any old copycat. Turns out the man had a son and one that may have been exposed to his crimes as a young boy (properly traumatizing him no doubt) named Francis Carter. However, this trauma sure doesn’t excuse what Francis goes on to do. The book ends with Jake and Tom safe and Francis unable to hurt them again. Frank and his son get an interesting reunion in prison.
I hope you enjoyed this review! Have you read The Whisper Man by Alex North before? What did you think?
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