On Borrowed Time

✍ Scribed by Rosenfelt, David

• Publisher: Minotaur Books
• Year: 2011
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 143 KB
• Edition: 1st ed
• Category: Fiction

✦ Synopsis

What if it were possible that your most cherished memories werelies and that finding out the truth could cost you your life?

Richard Kilmer is head over heels in love with JenniferRyan, who takes him home to meet her parents, where she accepts his marriage proposal. While visiting, they set out on a nostalgic drive up to Kendrick Falls. On their way there, a freak storm rolls in, Richard loses control of his car, and it rolls. When the storm clears in a matter of seconds, Jen is gone. Richard cant find her, and neither can the police who respond to the scene.More horrifying is that no one in Richard's life will even confirm Jens existence, and all traces of her have disappeared.

Where could she be? Has Richard lost his mind, or has something far worse happened?

David Rosenfelts On Borrowed Time is a stunning new thriller about an ordinary man who is trapped in a nightmare where he cant be certain of anythingnot even his own memories.

From Publishers Weekly

Starred Review. At the start of this excellent stand-alone from Rosenfelt (Down to the Wire), 29-year-old journalist Richard Kilmer is planning to ask the love of his life, Jennifer Ryan, to marry him. But on a drive from Manhattan's Upper West Side, where they share an apartment, to Jen's hometown two hours outside the city, they have an accident and Jen disappears. After Richard discovers to his astonishment that Jen's family, her friendseven his friendsclaim never to have known her, he begins a series of magazine articles about his unsettling experience (a nice variation on the frequent but unconvincing hush-hush imperative of many thrillers). Meanwhile, it becomes clear that some nefarious memory experiment involving Richard is underway. The arrival from Wisconsin of Allison Tynes, who says she's Jen's identical twin sister, may strike some as contrived, but all will marvel at the way Rosenfelt builds suspense while keeping the plot line from veering too far into the kooky and hokey. (Feb.)
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From Booklist

This one pulls you in and wont let you go. Skillful as Rosenfelt is, he cant take all the credit. Hes working a sure-fire theme, one thats at least as old as Hitchcocks The Lady Vanishes and as new as Jodie Fosters Flight Plan. The leads traveling companion suddenly isnt there. Frantic inquiries reveal this person never existed. The lead is tagged a crazy and is in danger of arrest. So it is with Rosenfelts hero. In a moment, his lover is gone. Even the settings where the romance played out have vanished. Rosenfelts fans have always appreciated his turn on the crime novel. His heroes are not troubled, fragile men but cheerful chaps not above enjoying the puzzle theyve been thrown into. This novel suffers the plots curse: there is no way the solution can be as intriguing as the mystery. And along the way to a solution, a couple of significant holes in the storys infrastructure appear. Never mind. The novel still works a spooky turn on the old chestnut, and readers will enjoy being mystified one more time. --Don Crinklaw