By Larissa Page
It has been a while since I’ve read (or in this case, listened) to a thriller that creeped me out, surprised me, and kept me hooked the whole time. Hidden Pictures did that for me.
Mallory is 18 months clean after her life was upended as a teenager. At the reference of her sponsor, she gets a job as a live-in nanny for a seemingly well-to-do family and their five-year-old son, Teddy. But when Teddy starts giving Mallory strange and disturbing drawings outside of his skill level, Mallory starts to wonder what else might be going on and whether Teddy’s imaginary friend Onya is really imaginary or something more sinister.
This novel started strong for me, dealing with the possible fallout of Mallory’s addiction now that she’s clean. The hook kept going as she moved in with the family she was to nanny for and met the lovely Teddy, who was a sweetly written character I think all readers will come to love. The eerie feelings started fairly early in the novel and continued to get stronger as the story reached the climax. Maybe it was just because I listened to it on audio, but I felt the creep down in my belly—it gave me the heebie-jeebies, which is exactly what I look for in a thriller.
Additionally, I started to guess what the “big twist” might be, but I was only partly right when it happened. As someone who very often guesses the big twist halfway through a thriller, I absolutely love that the author was able to misdirect readers enough to keep me guessing until the end. This is the type of thriller and plot that I would absolutely love to discuss with other people and was close to spoiling in this review, but I don’t want to give away the ending so that is all I will say.
I really enjoyed all aspects of this thriller. I loved the creep it gave me. I loved the mystery Mallory tries to solve. I loved Mallory’s story as well and all the little clues we get about her life, and her tragedy before she reveals it to us. I thought it was well put together and I’m really glad I picked it up. The audio in particular was great, but I believe the physical book would also be fantastic.