Thriller Annotation - All The Dangerous Things by Stacy Willingham

Author: Stacy Willingham

Title: All the Dangerous Things

Genre: Thriller

Publication Date: January 10, 2023

Number of Pages: 332

Geographical Setting: Savannah, Georgia (present) and Beaufort, South Carolina (past)

Time Period: The twentieth century (1999) and the twenty-first century (2022-2023)

Series: Not applicable

Plot Summary: One year after the abduction of her young son, Mason, and with no new leads, Isabelle Drake decides to conduct her own investigation into her son’s disappearance, sharing her story with those interested in true crime, much to the chagrin of the detective assigned to the case. After hearing Isabelle speak at a true crime convention, Waylon, a true crime podcaster, persuades Isabelle to tell her story to his listeners in the hopes that someone will come forward with knowledge about what happened the night Mason disappeared. However, it is not long before Isabelle and Waylon suspect the other is keeping secrets. Further complicating Isabelle’s attempts to find Mason is her physical, though not legal separation from her husband Ben, Mason’s father, who left Isabelle when her preoccupation with finding their son became obsessive, causing severe and unrelenting insomnia. When too many sleepless nights and new clues in the case cause Isabelle to question her sanity and wonder whether she can trust herself, who can she depend on to help her find her son? The chapters alternate between 1999 and 2023. A slow unraveling of Isabelle's family culminated in tragedy in 1999 when Isabelle was eight years old. In the present day, this tragedy continues to haunt Isabelle, who struggles to reconcile her guilt and fear that she may be complicit in both this tragedy and Mason's disappearance, as many following the case suspect.

Subject Headings:

Mother and child – Fiction

Mothers of kidnapped children – Fiction

Kidnapping investigation – Fiction

Memory – Fiction

Insomnia – Fiction

Secrecy – Fiction

Psychological – Fiction

Detective and mystery – Fiction

Podcasters – Fiction (WorldCat, n.d.)

Appeals:

Pacing and Story Line: 

 

Wyatt and Saricks state that thrillers often have “time/date stamps at the head of chapters, placed there to emphasize the idea that every minute counts” (Wyatt & Saricks, 2019, p. 5). They further explain that thrillers “build from event to event, offering the reader a rush of movement to follow” (Wyatt & Saricks, 2019, p. 5). All The Dangerous Things loosely abides by this formula, fluctuating between every three or so chapters in the present-day (2023), followed by one chapter from Isabelle’s childhood, in 1999, until the end of the novel. Willingham simply labels the chapter headings ‘then’ and ‘now’ with Isabelle’s experiences and memories of her past colliding with and shaping her present. 

 

Tone: 

Isabelle is grieving the abduction of her son and her marriage throughout the novel, further fueled by her insomnia, which causes a continued decline in her mental well-being. These factors culminate in the novel having an overall disparaging tone.

 

Characterization: 

 

Isabelle Drake had a traumatic childhood that continues to haunt her as an adult, the details of which are gradually “revealed[,] bit by bit” (Wyatt & Saricks, 2019, p. 7), building upon each other to produce an atmosphere of tension and paranoia. 

 

Frame/Setting:

 

The geographical and topographical locations in thrillers can help enhance the suspense factor (Wyatt & Saricks, 2019, p. 8), demonstrated in All The Dangerous Things, where the setting alternates between Savannah, Georgia, and Beaufort, South Carolina. According to Isabelle’s coworker, Savannah, Georgia, is “the most haunted city in America” (Willingham, 2023, p. 50-51). Additionally, the mansion in which Isabelle and her family lived in Beaufort, South Carolina, had, according to Isabelle, “[t]he ever-present aura of something, or someone, trying to warn us, scare us” (Willingham, 2023, p. 69). The eeriness of the two settings intensifies Isabelle’s sense of paranoia and the readers’ sense of anticipation throughout. 

 

Language/Style:

 

Wyatt and Saricks state that “. . . [a]drenaline novels exhibit a range of styles, including poetic, elegant prose at one end of the spectrum and more prosaic, conversational language at the other” (Wyatt & Saricks, 2023, p. 9). I would categorize Willingham’s novel as sitting in the middle of that continuum, with much of the lyricism appearing in young Isabelle’s descriptions of her childhood home and the area of South Carolina in which she grew up. For example, she describes the marsh as “smell[ing] of death” (Willingham, 2023, p. 171), hating “the way it comes creeping through the cracked windowpane, snaking its way beneath my nostrils like a finger beckoning me close” (Willingham, 2023, p. 171). However, the conversations in the novel are far more colloquial complete with pauses, slang terminology, and filler words. 

3 Terms That Best Describe This Book:

Deceptive

Captivating

Affecting

Similar Authors and Works:

 

3 Relevant Non-Fiction Works and Authors:

 

Are You There Alone?: The Unspeakable Crime of Andrea Yates by Suzanne O'Malley is a relevant non-fiction work because, according to the author’s note in the back of the book, a portion of All The Dangerous Things was based loosely on Andrea Yates, whose crime I will not reveal, so as not to spoil the twist in Willingham’s story. However, I will say that I think following All The Dangerous Things up with a read of O’Malley’s book better contextualizes the events in Willingham’s novel. 

 

What Have I Done? by Laura Dockrill is a memoir that documents the author’s battle with and eventual recovery from postpartum insomnia and psychosis, two conditions plaguing women in Isabelle’s family in All The Dangerous Things. 

 

Sleepwalker: The Mysterious Makings and Recovery of a Somnambulist by Kathleen Frazier is another memoir similar to All the Dangerous Things. Frazier's memoir tells of her experience with frightening sleepwalking experiences similar to Isabelle's in All The Dangerous Things. She additionally covers how these experiences affected her physical and mental health and her relationships with her family.

 

3 Relevant Fiction Works and Authors:

 

What She Knew by Gilly Macmillan contains themes like All The Dangerous Things, specifically child abduction, self-doubt, paranoia, dysfunctional family dynamics, and dysfunctional romantic relationships.

 

Insomnia: A Novel by Sarah Pinborough contains similarities to All The Dangerous Things with its unreliable narrator and focus on themes of insomnia, paranoia, and dysfunctional families. 

 

Little Secrets by Jennifer Hillier aligns with the themes of child abduction, infidelity, and revenge, all present in Stacy Willingham’s All The Dangerous Things. 

 

References:

Dockrill, L. (2020). What Have I Done? Square Peg.

Frazier, K. (2015). Sleepwalker: The Mysterious Makings and Recovery of a Somnambulist. Skyhorse Publishing.

Hillier, J. (2020). Little Secrets. Minotaur Books.

Macmillan, G. (2015). What She Knew. William Morrow.

O’Malley, S. (2004). Are You There Alone?: The Unspeakable Crime of Andrea Yates. Simon & Schuster.

Pinborough, S. (2022). Insomnia: A Novel. William Morrow.

Willingham, S. (n.d.). All The Dangerous Things. https://www.stacywillingham.com/all-the-dangerous-things

Willingham, S. (2023). All The Dangerous Things. Minotaur Books.

WorldCat. (n.d.). All the Dangerous Things. https://www.worldcat.org/title/1346124960

Wyatt, N. & Saricks, J.G. (2019). The Reader's Advisory Guide to Genre Fiction. (3rd ed.). ALA Editions.