‘Prodigal’ by Michael Waterhouse is an emotional and very engrossing read. I was drawn in by the synopsis, the cover and then the story itself had me almost stuck to the book.

Stephen Padgett is a young man who has found his home within the Army. His childhood was quite a troubled one and he finally feels he belongs somewhere. He is on tour in Afghanistan when he is taken hostage. Stephen knows he has to find a way to save himself somehow. He is trapped in a dark, dank cell with his translator Rashid who was taken before him. He ruminates on his life and all the choices he made throughout. In London, his parents are on tenterhooks impatiently waiting for any news. As they wait they start to consider that they may never see their son again. They look back on his troubled youth and how they dealt with him. They wonder if they could have made a difference in any way by treating him differently. Sat thinking what if? as they sit and wait to see if he ever returns home again.

The story is told by moving from the past to the present and from character to character. The broad but also in-depth view we are given allows us to actually feel how each of the characters feel in this deep and very personal journey. The way Michael Waterstone transports us to Afghanistan with Stephen and Rashid in their cell then back to be with his parents as they wait is written so well that I felt as if I was waiting for the phone too.

The kidnap of a soldier in Afghanistan is emotional enough to hear on the news, see on the tv. Then to be the actual family of the victim is a truly different animal altogether. The intensity of the need for news and the stress when the phone doesn’t ring. This book is the most moving story that has the power to keep you reading and waiting for the phone to ring. I was hoping against hope that Stephen would arrive back to his family sooner or later.

‘Prodigal’ is a thriller that is quite different in the way that we see a family who is in the centre of a disaster with all the normal problems that families face daily still going on around them. A book that kept me interested all the way through and times on the edge of my seat too.

Thanks to Random Things Tours and The Conrad Press for the copy of the book and my place on the tour.