All He Has Left

Dollycas’s Thoughts

Jake Slater lost his wife and almost lost his daughter, Piper, in an appalling hit-and-run accident. Then his affluent inlaws fought him for custody of Piper but Jake prevailed. He packed up their life and moved away. A year later his wife’s parents want to host a party to celebrate her 13th birthday. He grudgingly allows his daughter to attend but he doesn’t stick around.

He arrives to pick Piper up at her cousin’s when he hears a gunshot. Inside he finds her cousin Caitlyn had been shot and Piper missing. Caitlyn breathlessly tells him “Piper knows the truth”, before she dies. He then sees a man taking Piper away. He gives chase but is too late. The police arrive and Jake is the only witness to what happened. From their questioning, he sees he is their prime suspect and no one appears to be concerned about Piper. He has to find her. When he gets the chance he runs.

Now his face is all over television and social media. The FBI has been brought in. And he is being tracked by a killer. He can’t let anything get in the way of finding his daughter and he has no one to trust. When the truth starts to be revealed he is blindsided but doesn’t give up. He just hopes he can survive long enough to save his daughter.

I discovered Chad Zunker last year and when I was offered this book to review I jumped at the chance.

Jake Slater loved being a high school football coach. His wife and inlaws wanted him to get involved in the family business and he turned them down. Then his life implodes. My grandsons play football and I know the dedication the coaches put into the job personally so the character of Jake resonated with me right away. I also understood his downfall on the job he loved. He returned to work too soon and didn’t allow himself time to grieve. He also had to fight his inlaws to keep his daughter which added to the stress. He did what he had to do. I felt like I was right on the emotional roller coaster with him.

Mr. Zunker sets a quick pace and uses short chapters making this book impossible to put down. Readers follow Jake through every step of this tragic story. My heart was racing almost the entire time. Jake’s mind worked in fascinating ways to stay ahead of those trying to capture him. He was on a mission and faced many obstacles. The twists would have been hard for anyone to face but he kept going to get to the truth.

My only drawback of the story was a twist that put Jake’s high school girlfriend as the FBI Agent in Charge of his capture. Her actions did not follow protocol and the ending they had was just too predictable.

All He Has Left is an action-packed story where family secrets and powerful wealthy people crash together in a powerful plot. An engaging main character quickly draws readers into his life and forces them to hang on tight until the last page.

For me, Chad Zunker is an author to watch. I am excited about his next book set to be released on February 27, 2024. The Wife You Know sounds like it’s going to be another wildly emotional and suspenseful journey.

First Chad Zunker book I’ve read. This was a March freebie available to Prime members. Read the synopsis and thought it sounded interesting enough to give it a shot. Was glad I did.

This is a short book, around 200 pages in length. Don’t like to give away any spoilers. In brief, the main protagonist, Jake Slater, is a high school football coach who married into money. He goes through a devastating chain of events; his wife dies in a car crash, he relocates to start fresh in Austin TX, only to have his only daughter kidnapped, and another family member murdered. Jake is pinpointed by the police and FBI as a person of interest, and finds himself pursued, not only by the authorities, but the media and (surprise) a hired assassin. It’s a race against time as he covertly hunts for his daughter and attempts to stay alive and clear his name.

Because of the short length of the book, it quickly garners your interest and becomes a rapid page turner. There is no shortage of action, twists and turns and suspense in this thriller. A tad predictable but an entertaining thrill ride nonetheless. Well written and well edited, it’s presented in good taste. Minimal language and not overtly graphic with violence. I highly recommend this one and will seek out more by author Zunker. Not a masterpiece, just a quick enjoyable read. A strong four star effort.

I received this book as part of the Amazon Prime First Reads program where prime members can choose one book per month to download the ebook that is going to be released in the following month. This book was released on April 1, 2023.

This book was interesting but not a big favorite of mine. While it was advertised as a suspense/thriller book, I think it was more mystery with minimal suspenseful or thrilling elements. The main character is a man who was involved in a tragic hit and run accident with his wife and daughter in the car and unfortunately his wife passed away. His in-laws are incredibly wealthy and despise him because he is a high school football coach and they didn’t believe he was good enough for their daughter. So they try to take him through a custody battle but end up losing. Almost exactly a year after the car accident, the daughter notices a man working the catering at her birthday party as a man who was on the scene of the hit and run, which no one else knew about. So when the daughter is kidnapped and her cousin shot trying to protect her, the main character realizes the hit and run might not have been an accident at all and his family could have been targeted. The book follows the dad as he tries to find his daughter and whoever took her while he is also running from law enforcement because his in-laws told the police and FBI that they think he has something to do with it.

While it is an interesting premise and the character writing is good, I didn’t really enjoy it overall and found myself skimming long paragraphs to try to get it over with faster. I found it kind of difficult to believe that the police would actually consider him a suspect when there was proof that he arrived at the house after the cousin was shot and attempted to chase the kidnapper away from the house when they took his daughter. I’m also not a huge fan of when the main character gets framed for a crime personally so I think that definitely was evident in my rating of the book.