Kill Your Brother by Jack Heath

Publisher's Synopsis

Would you kill your brother to save yourself?

After months of searching, disgraced athlete Elise Glyk has finally found her missing brother, Callum. He's being held in a backyard prison by Stephanie Hartnell, a former sheep farmer with an axe to grind. But before she can free Callum or call for help, Elise is captured and locked up alongside him.

Stephanie Hartnell doesn't have room for two prisoners, and she has nothing against Elise. But she needs to make sure Elise can't go to the police. So she offers her a deal: kill Callum, and you're free to go.

Of course, Elise won't even consider the deal. No way. It's unthinkable. But she's running out of time to find another way out. And her brother may not have told her the whole truth ...

My Review of Kill Your Brother by Jack Heath

Kill Your Brother is a psychological thriller with a very distinguishing feature, and the title kinda gives away what the dilemma might be. This is an emotionally charged crime story from Jack Heath, better known for his powerful Tim Blake series (Hangman, Hunter, etc.)

Elise Glyk is a former star athlete who turned her hometown and, indeed, the entire country against her after a cheating scandal. She has daily problems to deal with (spray painted insults at her house, unsavory package deliveries, etc) but the thing that’s foremost in her mind is her missing brother, Callum. He’s a respected and popular teacher who disappeared suddenly and hasn’t been seen for a month.

The police aren’t proving to be much help so Elise conducts her own investigation and manages to track her brother’s movements to an old rundown farm. Against all her expectations she virtually stumbles upon her brother, imprisoned underground in a locked septic tank. Before she can either release him or make good her own escape, Elise is taken captive too.

The farm is owned by Stephanie Hartnell who, it turns out, believes Callum is responsible for her daughter’s death. She has been intent on getting a confession from him. Stephanie is unaware Elise is Callum’s brother, believing she is simply a private investigator. Now that she has two prisoners she offers Elise a deal: kill Callum and she is free to go.

This, of course, is out of the question but she agrees to the proposition, if only to join her brother in the cell in order to try to come up with an escape plan.

What follows is a deadly game of cat and mouse as Elise comes up with ways to avoid having to kill her brother while still appeasing Stephanie. At the same time, she begins to draw information from Callum which begins to become dotted with inconsistencies.

Kill Your Brother is an impressive thrill-ride that combines the desperation of the captive situation with a ticking clock scenario. On top of that is the gradual revelation of the story behind her brother and how he managed to get himself into this situation.

The strength character displayed by Elise throughout the story is a strong point of the story. We are taken through her past via selected flashback chapters explaining how she came to go from being a champion athlete to a cheat and the effect it had on her and her standing as a pariah in her community. For all of that she remains undaunted and defiant, strong enough to present as an admirable protagonist.

Another formidable, yet ultimately tragic character comes in the form of Stephanie. Although she is primarily the antagonist in the story you still get a strong sense of the pain and loss she feels over the death of her story. Although you don't exactly find yourself siding with her methods, you certainly get a strong sense of sympathy over her plight.

The book deals sympathetically with mental health issues, particularly depression and the trauma of coping with the loss of a loved one. Add to that the complexity around the rigorous world of high performance sports and the pressures to compete at the highest levels. Specifically, the poor choices that can change your life for the worse.

Overall, Kill Your Brother is a multi-layered thriller that produces unexpected twists and numerous high points. It is the epitome of the fast-paced crime novel that has you wondering how Elise and her brother are ever going to come out of it well. It ticks all the boxes and demands that you keep reading right til the end.