Hi. Welcome to my reviews! I finished a novella by Carolyn Nash called “The Trunk Key” a Kindle Single. This is a relatively new author. She has self-published on Amazon. Her first attempt was a memoir about her raising a severely traumatized son. According to her page on Amazon, she does not really want to market or get stuck in a niche. Hmmm..well.. ok..on to “The Trunk Key”.

This is the story about an overweight  34 year old single mother of two boys–Jennifer Caulfield. It is raining and she is driving on her way to work. It starts out with dialogue with her friend, (and later we find out also her boss), about breaking her diet and getting a doughnut. She is about at the doughnut shop when she gets into a near accident with another car. The trunk is held together with bungie cords and it pops open. For a split second, she sees what she believes is a small hand. She is sure that a child is inside. She calls the police, and they don’t believe her. She then is talking to her sister, Katie. Katie refers to a previous problem or incident when Jennifer was 14, a possible breakdown. She doesn’t believe it either. It alludes to a possible molestation from her uncle. That is what I assume is her motivation to cause her to follow this car and try to find out the truth.

Along the way, she runs into some construction workers and tries to enlist their help. One of them jumps into the car with her and assists her. They end up tracking him down, finding the girl and getting her to safety.  Then it ends.

I think this could have been good. The action with the car chase and the conflict with the kidnapper  and also with the sexual/romantic interest with this man could have been a great plot.  The problem is that it was never developed. The back story of her molestation was not fully developed, her interest in the man is not developed, nor his character. There were some glaring grammar usage problems that could have been corrected with  proofreading. (For instance, the use of the word “way” for “weigh”) and a few others. It felt quite unfinished. 

I was quite disappointed because I was hoping to find a great book for my first review, but in my opinion, this was not. There are many reasons why someone would self publish. That is not to say that they are all bad because they self publish, because that is not the case. I am sure there are some great treasures out there and I hope to prove that with my next review. I am still reading..so I invite you all to send me your opinions of books that you have read. Why did you like them? Why didn’t you? Let us all know. After all, that is why we are here!

-Becky-