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    The Boy at the Door: A Novel
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    The Boy at the Door: A Novel
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    The Boy at the Door: A Novel
    Audiobook12 hours

    The Boy at the Door: A Novel

    Written by Alex Dahl

    Narrated by Mozhan Marno, Sophie Amoss and Jenna Lamia

    3.5/5

    ()

    Currently unavailable

    Currently unavailable

    About this audiobook

    Set against a stunning Scandinavian backdrop, a gritty novel of psychological suspense that asks the question how far would you go to hold onto what you have?

    Cecilia Wilborg has it all—a loving husband, two beautiful daughters and a gorgeous home in the affluent Norwegian town of Sandefjord. And she works hard to keep it all together. Too hard. Because one mistake from her past could bring it all crashing down around her.

    Annika Lucasson lives a dark life with her abusive, drug-dealing boyfriend. She's lost everything one too many times and now she's got one last chance to save herself, thanks to Cecilia. Annika knows her secret—and just how much she's willing to do to make it all go away...

    When someone forgets to pick up their little boy at the local pool, Cecilia agrees to take him home, only to find an abandoned, empty house. It's the first step in the unraveling of her meticulously crafted life, as her and Annika's worlds collide...

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherPenguin Random House Audio
    Release dateJul 24, 2018
    ISBN9780525635253
    Unavailable
    The Boy at the Door: A Novel
    Author

    Alex Dahl

    Alex Dahl is a half-American, half-Norwegian author. Born in Oslo, she studied Russian and German linguistics with international studies, then went on to complete an MA in creative writing at Bath Spa University and an MSc in business management at Bath University. A committed Francophile, Alex loves to travel, and has so far lived in Moscow, Paris, Stuttgart, Sandefjord, Switzerland, Bath and London. She is the author of five other thrillers: After She'd Gone, Cabin Fever, Playdate, The Heart Keeper, and The Boy at the Door, which was shortlisted for the CWA Debut Dagger. Follow Alex on Twitter (@alexdahlauthor), Instagram (@authoralex) and Facebook (alexdahlauthor).

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    Reviews for The Boy at the Door

    3.5/5

    47 ratings11 reviews

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    Review must be at least 10 words

    • 4/5
      Cecelia had a perfect life with a perfect husband, two daughters, a beautiful home, and an enjoyable part-time job.One night could change it all.Cecelia picked her daughters up from swim practice, and as she waited for them to change, she was asked to take a young boy home because his parents didn’t show up.Cecelia didn’t want to do it, but she couldn’t leave him at the school alone. Taking him home was the worst thing that could have happened to her because he may be the reason her secret becomes revealed. For some reason the boy, Tobias, knows Cecelia knew Annie, the woman who took care of him and abandoned him. We get background information on Annie that is not very pleasant and then move back and forth to the present with the little boy that connects it all.I wasn't a fan of the main character Cecilia. Her past lifestyle was off-putting for me, and her current life was made of lies. She currently had everything and still wasn't happy.Tobias was a sweet boy who kept everything inside, and he definitely had secrets and answers to the questions the police were asking, but he wouldn't tell them anything. Some of the other characters were very unpleasant. The ongoing questions in the story line are who is Tobias' mother, how did Cecelia really know Annie, and just what is Cecelia’s secret that will destroy her current life.The author’s writing keeps you engaged and especially when she leaves an incriminating, clue-revealing tidbit as the last sentence of the chapter and moves on. We gets hints about what is bothering Cecelia, but never enough information to figure it out. Tobias knows, though, and Cecelia is worried.THE BOY AT THE DOOR is brilliantly written with a creative, odd story line that is a bit unbelievable, but oh so good and attention grabbing. The tension kept me on the edge of my seat as the police questioned Cecelia about Annie and Tobias. THE BOY AT THE DOOR is an excellent suspense debut. 4/5I received an advanced reader copy of this book from the publisher and NetGalley.
    • 4/5
      3.5 It starts when Cecilia, who is picking her own young daughtersup from swim class, is asked to take a young boy home as no one has come to pick him up. This young boy will change things for Cecilia and her family, and in a way that will be the cause of many lies and exposed secrets. Who is this boy? Cecilia, keeps a tight reign on her life, everything must be just so, from her house to her appearance. She is beyond driven,she is also any reliable narrators,so how much can we believe when things keep rapidly changing. Another young woman, Anni, also plays a part, and her journals are an important part of this story. These two women differ in many ways, but they also share many commonalities. In essence they are two sides of the same coin.How I enjoy Nordic mysteries, thrillers. No dramatics at play here, just solid writing and situations that are often as chilly as the weather. This one tied me up in knots, never knew what to believe, where it was going. I love when that happens. The two women were not very sympathetic at times, and surprisingly my favorite character would be a secondary but integral one. The paths that can be taken to deceive, how one like leads to another, with one young boy caught in the middle. Cecilia's husband is either naive, a saint or really loves his wife because he is presented with some difficult snd constantly changing scenarios. A well done Nordic thriller with multifaceted characters. A sisters read and one which we all enjoyed, eliciting some good discussions.ARC from Netgalley.
    • 5/5
      Imagine.A small, unfamiliar boy is standing, parentless, companionless, by the swimming pool reception. The pool is closing. The receptionist wants to go home. You want to go home. The receptionist asks you to take the boy home and you agree, reluctantly. But when you get there, the house is clearly not a home. What do you do now? It’s dark. It’s raining. It’s late. Do you call someone? Or do you take the child home with you?Cecilia Wilborg takes the boy home. Why she does this and the subsequent threat to her carefully curated existence forms the narrative arc of this compelling thriller. Who is this boy? Who is Cecilia? And how far will she go to protect what she considers hers?What’s it about?Ooh so many things. Primarily the unravelling of Cecilia’s life: the reader is desperate to understand Cecilia’s secret, then desperate to see if she can keep it! But it’s about more than that. It’s about the weight of expectations on women growing up in Norway. It’s about the damage we do to others and ourselves. It’s about the damage we do to our children.Cecilia is the main female character, but she’s not the only female voice, and I was fascinated by the relationship that develops between her and another damaged woman. The parallels between them are striking but the contrasts are even more so. Cecilia despises the other woman but cannot see the whole truth of her, even when given unparalleled access to her thoughts. But then, as Sue Trowbridge accurately notes, Cecilia is ‘at best, a narcissist, and at worst, a sociopath’ (quoted from review on The Saturday Reader). She is a spectacularly unreliable narrator, who abuses drink, drugs and people she perceives to be her social inferior, constantly distancing the reader with her little cruelties and complete self-absorption. It’s a testament to Dahl’s skill that, somehow, we find ourselves not quite hating her: somewhere, under all that façade, there is a sad little girl who never grew up.What’s it like?Compelling. Disquieting. Completely unputdownable. (Genuinely: I tried to go to bed when I had fifty pages remaining; I couldn’t sleep so had to get up and read to the end!) I loved the way actions are gradually revealed and the ending was fantastic.Although I do love unreliable narrators, it is perhaps refreshing to have a break from Cecilia’s concerns to hear from two other first-person narrators: another woman and the boy himself. Gradually, the history of all three characters is fully revealed, offering fresh insight into the events at the beginning of the story. Dahl cleverly interweaves the three, revealing or hinting towards just enough information to keep us frantically turning pages, searching for the truth. Cecilia herself wonders: ‘Have I told so many lies, both to myself and to others, that I have lost the ability to recognise the truth?’Final thoughtsThis was an absolutely compelling domestic thriller with two deeply troubled female protagonists. Having thoroughly enjoyed reading this, I now find myself still thinking about the characters and the connections between them, their obsessions, their choices and, of course, their impact on a small boy who just wanted love.I can’t wait to read what Alex Dahl writes next.Many thanks to Alex Dahl for giving me an advance copy of this book at CrimeFest. This is my honest review.
    • 3/5
      Cecilia Wilborg lacks nothing; she has what seems to be a perfect life with her husband and two daughters, though it soon becomes clear that she is keeping some dark secrets from her family. They end up providing a temporary foster home for a young boy named Tobias, and Cecilia’s life starts to unravel when she learns he has connections to Annika Lucasson. Annika, a drug addict with an abusive drug-dealing boyfriend, is privy to Cecilia’s secrets which if revealed would destroy her life.The novel has three narrators. Cecilia’s first-person narration is interspersed with some chapters from Tobias’ perspective, also written in the first person, and some journal entries and letters written by Annika. Cecilia’s narration becomes annoying because she keeps withholding information. Instead, she just goes on and on about her fears that her life will disintegrate: “I’m overwhelmed by a sensation of the past as a slithering snake sneaking up on me, ready to unleash its poison on this immaculate life I’ve fought so hard for” and “maybe [Tobias’ presence] won’t dislodge those huge, black boulders inside of me and send them crashing onto this life I’ve managed to preserve against some hefty odds” and “his very presence threatens to unleash a wave of grief and regret so huge it would knock me down forever if I don’t keep suppressing it at any cost.” Cecilia is not a likeable person; she certainly did not get any sympathy from me. She is materialistic: “being me is very expensive” and “I prefer my surroundings to be beautiful at all times.” She is very shallow, constantly making judgments about people based on their appearance: “Back then she was a timid, chubby girl with messy pigtails and hand-me-down clothes, and she’s not really that different now. Scruffy is the word that comes to mind. I must admit that she’s gone from awkwardly tall and “big-boned” to what I suppose some people might call statuesque, but she most definitely retains that gangly, clownish presence I remember from childhood.” The decisions she made in the past and continues to make reveal her to be narcissistic and self-absorbed. She once met a man and “less than ten minutes after he sat down beside me, Thiago was inside me”?! She is not the greatest of mothers; she complains how her daughters keep viewing YouTube makeup tutorials and are constantly arguing, but she does nothing to intervene. Johan, Cecilia’s husband, once tells her, “’You’re a bitch. You can be so much more than that, and you know I love you dearly, but sometimes you really are a bitch.’” That describes her perfectly. As more and more about Cecilia is revealed, I ended up not caring what happened to her. Several events are just unbelievable. I know nothing about Child Services in Norway but I can’t imagine that they would place a vulnerable child in a foster home that had not been properly vetted. A child in foster care could suffer an injury and the family could keep him from attending school for some time and authorities wouldn’t care? Then when the scar from the injury is obvious, no one would investigate? Then there are the many coincidences. Tobias gives Cecilia a key that, pardon the pun, unlocks everything? How convenient! Even the ownership of a farmhouse is connected to both Cecilia and Annika’s families?The book is described as a “gritty novel of psychological suspense.” There is grit since the novel includes substance abuse, prostitution, rape, physical abuse, abandoned children, and murder, but the glacial pace means there is little suspense. In fact, the nature of Cecilia’s secrets is not difficult to guess long before the truth is revealed. Even the title is misleading; Tobias is never a boy at the door. Note: I received a digital galley from the publisher via NetGalley.
    • 2/5
      Because of the sheer amount of books I read, I often think I lose some perspective - especially if I read a couple of books in a row that are in the same category. I can imagine that someone who does not read a lot of "psychological thrillers" might really enjoy this book. There were some nice twists and the identity of the boy did keep me guessing especially with two women having parallel experiences, but at the same time being completely different.

      FYI - this is also another book with the unreliable narrator. I find myself getting frustrated that the narrator does not tell us what she knows and instead we are made to wade through words that don't matter to get to what does.

      A good enough book.

      A review copy of this book was provided by the publisher.
    • 3/5
      When picking her daughters up from swimming, Cecilia Wilborg agrees to drop off a young boy whose mother didn’t get him. Turns out the address they have is an abandoned home. Cecilia can’t leave him there and takes him back to her house. That’s when all the trouble begins.As the story unfolds, we learn how the little boy is and where he came from. Told from various points of view, we learn more about Cecilia, the boy Tobias, and the woman he was with. Was it suspenseful? I don’t think so. Some of the story was predictable and other parts were unrealistic at first. I wanted to like the characters, but Tobias was the only one I felt anything for. It started off interesting, but soon slowed down and dragged. Sorry, it was okay, just not my thing.
    • 4/5
      This book was dark, disturbing, and a bit of a hot mess and yet I couldn't put it down. Cecilia Wilborg has that "perfect" life. She has a beautiful home, a rich and successful husband, and two daughters. But guess what? It could all come crashing down when a mysterious little boy enters the picture.So I definitely got caught up in the story even if at times I was thinking it was veering into unrealistic territory. There's a lot going on but it somehow all seemed to work and it ended up being an entertaining read. I would love to read another book by the author because she certainly knows how to craft an interesting tale. Definitely recommend giving this one a chance especially if you love Scandinavian mysteries and can handle main characters that aren't easy to like at times.Thank you to First to Read for the opportunity to read an advance digital copy! I was under no obligation to post a review and all views expressed are my honest opinion.
    • 3/5
      This book was a bit of a let down for me. Great sorry, very interesting, but way too long with too many irrelevant chapters and details. It took until 3/4ths of the way through this book to really feel the hook for me.
    • 2/5
      I wanted to love this book. I really did. I heard about it in a book magazine, and I fell in love with the blurb.

      However, I got to reading this book, and I found myself not caring about what happens. The pacing was just to slow for me, yet I continued to read in case it got better. It did not.

      As for the characters, I found myself not caring about them. I just couldn’t connect to any of them. I did like Johan from the Little I read of him. I wondered why he’d stay with a horrible piece of work like Celia. And Celia was definitely a nasty piece of work! The way she treats her husband is vile! She talks about showering him with plenty of sex and affection and then basically being a bitch to them in order to get him to stay. She recommends other women do this too. No, thank you. The way she acts when she hears that Tobias is going to be staying with her for a few months is just horrible too. I realize it’s a big deal to have a kid you’ve never known come to stay with you for a few months, but I just felt she was way over the top. And don’t get me started on how she treats other people like she’s better than them. Yet she wants to come across to others as having the perfect family, so why treat others like crap if you are concerned with how they perceive you? Celia is nothing but a spoiled, selfish, vile brat. She’s one of the main reasons I couldn’t finish this book.

      Maybe others will like this book, but I just couldn’t get into it due to slow pacing and mainly because I couldn’t torture myself to keep reading about Celia. This is being added to my DNR shelf.

      (I received a free ebook of this title from the First to Read program).
    • 4/5
      Inferno by Julie Kagawa is the final book in the Talon series and it does not disappoint! Cobalt and his hatchlings are all together and safe for the moment but an anonymous tip lets Ember and Cobalt know that Talon has more plans at world domination in the works. This leads them to have to make allies with their dreaded nemesis St. George. Their uneasy alliance has everyone on edge and only through their cooperation in this battle can either group hope to survive. This book was fast paced and well thought out. I enjoyed seeing the two groups work together with the aid of other outside parties. The book did not leave any loose ends and concluded quiet well. An excellent ending to an excellent series. Definitely worth reading.
    • 3/5
      This is yet another twisty novel with an unreliable female narrator. While I haven't encountered this exact plot before, I've seen that structure way too many times. In this case the "big twist" was telegraphed so early in the book that it hardly counted as a twist at all. In the affluent community of Sandefjord, Norway everyone leads a life full of foreign vacations, tennis matches with the girls and getting eyelash extensions. The protagonist Cecilia Wilborg (the total narcissist, liar, interior stylist and "sexy Scandi gym-bunny fashionista") is living with her husband Johan and young daughters Nicoline and Hermine. One evening Tobias 8, who is new to Hermine's swim class, isn't picked up by Anni, the woman who had enrolled him, and Cecilia is asked to take him home. The address she is given turns out to be a vacant shack and when Tobias begs her to let him stay with her family for the night Cecilia agrees and that is the beginning of the end to her contented life.The story is told from the alternate points of view of Cecilia, Tobias and Anni. Cecelia is so thoroughly unlikeable she's like a caricature of a person. For the entire book I kept hoping that Johan would stop being a doormat and leave her. Although I totally empathized with Tobias, I didn't care for the Tobias chapters, which were basically info dumps. The Anni chapters were written in the form of her journals and conveniently filled in all of the blanks in the plot near the end of the book. I would have preferred it if the author had found a way of showing things happening rather than having Tobias and Anni tell us about them.The book was just ok for me, although it did hold my interest. The plot, while improbable, was not completely beyond the realm of possibility. However the police and social worker procedure seemed a little off. I loathed the epilogue. Had I had a paper copy of the book I would have been tempted to put it through the shredder. Nevertheless, I might try this author again some day.I received a free copy of this book from the publisher.