“…after tonight he will hate me and I don’t blame him. I’ve trapped him. It was mean of me to use his wedding vows like that, when he wrote them with so much love, because I’m pretty sure neither of us mentioned anything about helping the other cover up a killing. I don’t think that comes under ‘in sickness or in health and forsaking all others’…”

The Call is the third novel by British author, P.D. Viner. At a minute before midnight in early February, Ben Kingdom wakes from an unusually deep sleep to hear his wife, Mia calling for his help. She’s not there, in the house, and when he calls her mobile, he hears it ringing. Locating it, in her hidden handbag, amongst all the usual essentials she carries, has him puzzled.

And then a phone rings (the landline!!), the answering machine clicks in, and he sees that she has left multiple, increasingly frantic, messages. When he finally talks to Mia, she begs for his help, invoking their marriage vows, is vague about just what has happened, except that it involves a dead man, and gives him very specific instructions on what he must bring if he agrees to help her out: gloves, bleach, towels, garbage bags, a knife and hammer (?!), and how to avoid being seen or tracked.

Can such a beginning fail to intrigue the reader? Little more, however, can be said about the plot of this riveting page-turner without spoilers, although it perhaps doesn’t give too much away to reveal that Viner manages to include arson, dumpster diving with a difference, an unconventional use for a certain date-rape drug, lies, secrets, infidelity and grief.

This is a story that plays out over a mere seven hours and each chapter is headed with a time; the narrative alternates between Mia and Ben, so the reader is privy to both perspectives on what occurs; flashbacks fill in a bit of the couple’s history. One of these narrators turns out to be quite unreliable, continually lying (often by omission), but the other hasn’t been completely candid either.

Many chapters end with a loaded remark that adds another layer, another complication, another twist to the story. Sometimes drama tips into melodrama, and the reader may need to don their disbelief suspenders at times, so the best advice is to just keep them on, go with the flow and enjoy the rollercoaster ride.

Despite the grittiness of the story, there is plenty of black humour, much of it relying on incongruity e.g. Ben ready to disapprove if Mia has shoplifted two cans of drink, just hours after he has helped her conceal a body.

Viner does have a way with words: Ben, in the dumpster “It’s disgusting in here, and there’s barely enough light to see anything clearly. It’s wet, in an oozy bin-juice way; all rot and decay and entropy – the three unknown brothers of the seven deadly dwarves.” A gripping thriller that surprises, at times, by being laugh-out-loud funny.
This unbiased review is from an uncorrected proof copy provided by NetGalley and Hera Books.