All the Dangerous Things: A Novel

By Stacy Willingham

Following up her instant New York Times bestseller, A Flicker in the Dark, Stacy Willingham delivers a totally gripping thriller about a desperate mother with a troubled past in All the Dangerous Things.

One year ago, Isabelle Drake's life changed forever: her toddler son, Mason, was taken out of his crib in the middle of the night while she and her husband were asleep in the next room. With little evidence and few leads for the police to chase, the case quickly went cold. However, Isabelle cannot rest until Mason is returned to her—literally.

Except for the occasional catnap or small blackout where she loses track of time, she hasn’t slept in a year.

Isabelle's entire existence now revolves around finding him, but she knows she can’t go on this way forever. In hopes of jarring loose a new witness or buried clue, she agrees to be interviewed by a true-crime podcaster—but his interest in Isabelle's past makes her nervous. His incessant questioning paired with her severe insomnia has brought up uncomfortable memories from her own childhood, making Isabelle start to doubt her recollection of the night of Mason’s disappearance, as well as second-guess who she can trust... including herself. But she is determined to figure out the truth no matter where it leads.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Macmillan Publishers
• Release date: Jan 10, 2023
• ISBN: 9781250803863

Stacy Willingham

Stacy Willingham is the New York Times, USA Today and internationally bestselling author of psychological suspense. Her books include A Flicker in the Dark, All the Dangerous Things, Only If You're Lucky and Forget Me Not. Her debut, A Flicker in the Dark, has sold over one million copies in North America alone. It was the winner of Strand Magazine's Best Debut Award and a finalist for the Book of the Month's Book of the Year award, Goodreads Choice Best Debut award, Goodreads Choice Best Mystery & Thriller award, and ITW's Best First Novel award. Her work has been translated in more than thirty languages. Before turning to fiction, Stacy was a copywriter and brand strategist for various marketing agencies. She earned her B.A. in magazine journalism from the University of Georgia and M.F.A. in writing from the Savannah College of Art and Design. She lives in Charleston, South Carolina, with her husband, daughter, and dog.

Book preview

PROLOGUE

Today is day three hundred and sixty-four.

Three hundred and sixty-four days since my last night of sleep. That’s almost nine thousand hours. Five hundred and twenty-four thousand minutes. Thirty-one million seconds.

Or, if you want to go in the opposite direction, fifty-two weeks. Twelve months.

One whole year without a single night of rest.

One year of stumbling through life in a semiconscious dream state. One year of opening my eyes to find myself in another room, another building, without any recollection of when I got there or how I arrived.

One year of sleeping pills and eye drops and chugging caffeine by the quart-full. Of jittery fingers and drooping eyelids. Of becoming intimately familiar with the night.

One whole year since my Mason was taken from me, and still, I’m no closer to the truth.

CHAPTER ONE

NOW

Isabelle, you’re on in five.

My pupils are drilling into a spot in the carpet. A spot with no significance, really, other than the fact that my eyes seem to like it here. My surroundings grow fuzzy as the spot—my spot—gets sharper, clearer. Like tunnel vision.

Isabelle.

I wish I could always have tunnel vision: the ability to selectively focus on one single thing at a time. Turn everything else into static. White noise.

Isabelle.

Snap snap.

There’s a hand in front of my face now, waving. Fingers clicking. It makes me blink.

Earth to Isabelle.

Sorry, I say, shaking my head, as if the motion could somehow clear the fog like windshield wipers swiping at rain. I blink a few more times before trying to find the spot again, but it’s gone now. I know it’s gone. It’s melted back into the carpet, into oblivion, the way I wish I could. Sorry, yeah. On in five.

I lift my arm and take a sip of my Styrofoam cup of coffee—strong, black, squeaky when my chapped lips stick to the rim. I used to savor the taste of that daily morning cup. I lived for the smell of it wafting through my kitchen; the warmth of a mug pushed against my fingers, cold and stiff from standing on the back porch, watching the sun come up with morning dew beading on my skin.

But it wasn’t the coffee I needed, I know that now. It was the routine, the familiarity. Comfort-in-a-cup, like those dehydrated noodles you splash faucet water onto before popping them into the microwave and calling it a meal. But I don’t care about that anymore: comfort, routine. Comfort is a luxury I can no longer afford, and routine … well. I haven’t had that in a long time, either.

Now I just need the caffeine. I need to stay awake.

On in two.

I look up at the man standing before me, clipboard resting against his hip. I nod, down the rest of the coffee, and savor the bitter pinch in my jaw. It tastes like shit, but I don’t care. It’s doing its job. I dig my hand into my purse and pull out a bottle of eye drops—redness relief—and squirt three beads of liquid into each eye with expert precision. I guess this is my routine now. Then I stand up, run my hands over the front of my pants, and slap my palms against my thighs, signaling that I’m ready.

If you’ll follow me.

I hold out my arm, gesturing for the man to lead the way. And then I follow. I follow him out the door and through a dim hallway, the fluorescent lights buzzing in my ear like an electric chair humming to life. I follow him through another door, the gentle roar of applause erupting as soon as it opens and we step inside. I walk past him, to the edge of the stage, and stand behind a black curtain, the audience just barely obscured from view.

This is a big one. The biggest I’ve done.

I look down at my hands, where I used to hold notecards with talking points scribbled in pencil. Little bulleted instructions reminding me what to say, what not to say. How to order the story like I’m following a recipe, meticulous and careful, sprinkling the details in just right. But I don’t need those anymore. I’ve done this too many times.

Besides, there’s nothing new to say.

And now we are ready to bring out the person I know you’re all here to see.

I watch the man speaking onstage, ten feet away, his voice booming over the loudspeakers. It’s everywhere, it seems—in front of me, behind me. Inside me, somehow. Somewhere deep in my chest. The audience cheers again, and I clear my throat, remind myself why I’m here.

Ladies and gentlemen of TrueCrimeCon, it is my honor to present to you, our keynote speaker … Isabelle Drake!

I step into the light, walking with purpose toward the host as he signals me onstage. The crowd continues to yell, some of them standing, clapping, the beady little eyes of their iPhones pointed in my direction, taking me in, unblinking. I turn toward the audience, squinting at their silhouettes. My eyes adjust a bit, and I wave, smiling weakly before coming to a halt in the center.

The host hands me a microphone, and I grab it, nodding.

Thank you, I say, my voice sounding like an echo. Thank you all for coming out this weekend. What an incredible bunch of speakers.

The crowd erupts again, and I take the free seconds to scan the sea of faces the way I always do. It’s women, mostly. It’s always women. Older women in groups of five or ten, relishing this annual tradition—the ability to break away from their lives and their responsibilities and drown themselves in fantasy. Younger women, twentysomethings, looking skittish and a little embarrassed, like they’ve just been caught looking at porn. But there are men, too. Husbands and boyfriends who were dragged along against their will; the kind with wire-rimmed glasses and peach-fuzz beards and elbows that protrude awkwardly from their arms like knobby tree branches. There are the loners in the corner, the ones whose eyes linger just long enough to make you uncomfortable, and the police officers perusing the aisles, stifling yawns.

And then I notice the clothing.

One girl wears a graphic tee that says Red Wine and True Crime, the T in the shape of a gun; another sports a white shirt sprayed with specks of red—it’s supposed to mimic blood, I assume. Then I see a woman wearing a T-shirt that says Bundy. Dahmer. Gacy. Berkowitz. I remember walking past it earlier in the gift shop. It was clipped tight against a mannequin, being advertised in the same way they advertise overpriced band T-shirts in the merchandise tents at concerts, memorabilia for rabid fans.

I feel the familiar swell of bile in my throat, warm and sharp, and force myself to look away.

As I’m sure you all know, my name is Isabelle Drake, and my son, Mason, was kidnapped one year ago, I say. His case is still unsolved.

Chairs squeak; throats are cleared. A mousey woman in the front row is shaking her head gently, tears in her eyes. She is loving this right now, I know she is. It’s like she’s watching her favorite movie, mindlessly snacking on popcorn as her lips move gently, reciting every word. She’s heard my speech already; she knows what happened. She knows, but she still can’t get enough. None of them can. The murderers on the T-shirts are the villains; the uniformed men in back, the heroes. Mason is the victim … and I’m not really sure where that leaves me.

The lone survivor, maybe. The one with a story to tell.

CHAPTER TWO

I settle into my seat. The aisle seat. Generally, I prefer the window. Something to lean up against and close my eyes. Not to sleep, exactly. But to drift away for a while. Microsleeping, is what my doctor calls it. We’ve all seen it before, especially on airplanes: the twitching eyelids, the bobbing head. Two to twenty seconds of unconsciousness before your neck snaps back up with astonishing force like a cocking shotgun, ready to go.

I look at the seat to my right: empty. I hope it stays open. Takeoff is in twenty minutes; the gate is about to close. And when it does, I can move over. I can close my eyes.

I can try, as I’ve been trying for the last year, to finally get some rest.

Excuse me.

I jump, looking up at the flight attendant before me. She’s tapping the back of my seat, disapproval in her eyes.

We’re going to need you to make sure your seat back is in the upright and locked position.

I look back down, push the little silver button on my armrest, and feel my back begin to bend forward at an acute angle, my stomach folding in on itself. The attendant begins to walk away, pushing overhead compartments closed as she goes, when I reach out my arm and stop her.

Can I bother you for a soda water?

We’ll begin beverage service as soon as we take off.

Please, I add, grabbing her arm harder as she starts to step away. If you wouldn’t mind. I’ve been talking all day.

I touch my throat for emphasis, and she looks down the aisle at the other passengers squirming uncomfortably, adjusting their seat belts. Digging through backpacks for headphones.

Fine, she says, her lips pinched tight. Just a moment.

I smile, nod, and ease back into my seat before looking around the plane at the other passengers I’ll be sharing circulated air with for the next four hours as we make our way from Los Angeles to Atlanta. It’s a game I play, trying to imagine what they’re doing here. What life circumstances brought them to this exact moment, with this exact group of strangers. I wonder what they’ve been doing, or what they plan to do.

Are they going somewhere, or are they making their way home?

My eyes land first on a child sitting alone, giant headphones swallowing his ears. I imagine he’s a product of divorce, spending one weekend every month getting shuttled from one side of the country to the other like cargo. I feel myself starting to imagine how Mason might have looked at that age—how his green eyes could have morphed even greener, two twin emeralds twinkling like his father’s, or how his baby-smooth skin might have taken on the olive tone of my own, a natural tan without having to step foot in the sun.

I swallow hard and force myself to turn away, twisting to the left and taking in the others.

There are older men on laptops and women with books; teenagers on cell phones slouched low in their seats, gangly knees knocking into the seat backs in front of them. Some of these people are traveling to weddings or funerals; some are embarking on business trips or clandestine getaways paid for in cash. And some of these people have secrets. All of them do, really. But some of them have the real ones, the messy ones. The deep, dark, shadowy ones that lurk just beneath the skin, traveling through their veins and spreading like a sickness.

Dividing, multiplying, then dividing again.

I wonder which ones they are: the ones with the kinds of secrets that touch every organ and render them rotten. The kinds of secrets that will eat them alive from the inside out.

Nobody in here could possibly imagine what I’ve just spent my day doing: recounting the most painful moment of my life for the enjoyment of strangers. I have a speech now. A speech that I recite with absolute detachment, engineered in just the right way. Sound bites that I know will read well when ripped from my mouth and printed inside newspapers, and manufactured moments of silence when I want a point to sink in. Warm memories of Mason to break up a particularly tense scene when I’m sensing the need for some comedic relief. Just as I’m going deep into his disappearance—the open window I had discovered in his bedroom letting in a warm, damp breeze; the tiny mobile situated above his bed, little stuffed dinosaurs dancing gently in the wind—I stop, swallow. Then I recite the story of how Mason had just started talking. How he pronounced T. rex "Tyrantosnorious"—and how, every time he pointed at the little creatures above his bed, my husband would break out into exaggerated snores, sending him into a fit of giggles before drifting off himself. And then the audience would allow themselves to smile, maybe even laugh. There would be a visible release in their shoulders; their bodies would settle into their chairs again, a collectively held breath released. Because that’s the thing with the audience, the thing I learned long ago: They don’t want to get too uncomfortable. They don’t want to actually live through what I’ve lived through, every ugly moment. They just want a taste. They want enough for their curiosity to be satiated—but if it gets too bitter or too salty or too real, they’ll smack their lips and leave dissatisfied.

And we don’t want that.

The truth is, people love violence—from a distance, that is. Anyone who disagrees is either in denial or hiding something.

Your soda water.

I look up at the flight attendant’s outstretched arm. She’s holding a small cup of clear liquid, little bubbles rising to the surface and bursting with a satisfying fizz.

Thank you, I say, taking it from her and placing it in my lap.

You’ll need to keep your tray table stowed, she adds. We’ll be in the air soon.

I smile, taking a small sip to indicate that I understand. When she walks off, I lean down, digging my hand into my purse until I feel a mini bottle tucked neatly into the side pocket. I’m attempting to discreetly unscrew the cap when I feel a presence beside me, hovering close.

This is me.

My neck snaps up, and I’m half expecting to see somebody I know. There’s a familiarity in the voice above me, vague, like a casual acquaintance, but when I look up at the man standing in the aisle, I see a stranger with a TrueCrimeCon tote bag slung over one arm, the other pointing to the seat beside me.

The window seat.

He sees the mini bottle in my hand and grins. I won’t tell.

Thanks, I say, standing up to let him pass through.

I try not to glower at the prospect of being stuck next to an attendee on the flight home—it’s complicated, really, the way I feel about the fans. I hate them, but I need them. They’re a necessary evil: their eyes, their ears. Their undivided attention. Because when the rest of the world forgets, they remember. They still read every article, debating their theories on amateur sleuth forums as if my life is nothing more than a fun puzzle to be solved. They still curl up on their couches with a glass of Merlot in the evenings, getting lost in the comforting drone of Dateline. Trying to experience it without actually experiencing it. And that’s why events like TrueCrimeCon exist. Why people spend hundreds of dollars on airfare and hotel rooms and conference tickets: for a safe space where they can bask in the bloody glow of violence for just a few days, using another person’s murder as a means of entertainment.

But what they don’t understand, what they can’t understand, is that one day, they could wake up to find the violence crawling through their television screens, latching on to their houses, their lives, like a parasite sinking in its fangs. Wriggling in deep, making itself comfortable. Sucking the blood from their bodies and calling them home.

People never think it’ll happen to them.

The man glides past me and into his seat, pushing his bag beneath the chair in front of him. When I settle back in, I pick up where I left off: the gentle crack of the cap breaking, the glug of vodka as it pours into my drink. I stir it with my finger before taking a long sip.

I saw your keynote.

I can feel my seatmate looking at me. I try to ignore him, closing my eyes and leaning my head against the headrest. Waiting for the vodka to make my eyelids just heavy enough to stay closed for a bit.

I’m so sorry, he adds.

Thank you, I say, eyes still shut. Even though I can’t actually sleep, I can act like I’m sleeping.

You’re good, though, he continues. I can feel his breath on my cheek, smell the spearmint gum wedged between his molars. At telling the story, I mean.

It’s not a story, I say. It’s my life.

He’s quiet for a while, and I think that did it. I usually try not to make people uncomfortable—I try to be gracious, play the role of the grieving mother. Shaking hands and nodding my head, a grateful smile plastered across my face that I immediately wipe away like lipstick the second I step away. But right now I’m not at the conference. It’s over, I’m done. I’m going home. I don’t want to talk about it anymore.

I hear the intercom come to life above us, a scratchy echo.

Flight attendants, prepare doors for departure and cross-check.

I’m Waylon, the man says, and I can feel his arm thrust in my direction. Waylon Spencer. I have a podcast—

I open my eyes and look in his direction. I should have known. The familiar voice. The fitted V-neck and dark-wash skinny jeans. He doesn’t look like the typical attendee, with his glossy hair shaved into a sloping gradient at the neck. He’s not into murder for entertainment; he’s in it for business.

I’m not sure which is worse.

Waylon, I repeat. I look down at his outstretched hand, his expectant face. Then I swivel my neck around and shut my eyes again. "I don’t want to come across as rude, Waylon, but I’m not interested."

It’s really gaining some traction, he says, pressing on. Number five in the app store.

Good for you.

We even solved a cold case.

I can’t tell if it’s the sudden movement of the plane—a gentle lurch that makes my stomach flip, my limbs pushing deep into the seat as we rattle down the runway, this giant metal box we’re all locked inside moving faster and faster, making my eardrums swell—or if it’s his words that make me feel suddenly uneasy.

I take a deep breath, dig my nails into the armrest.

Flying make you nervous?

Can you stop? I spit, my head snapping back in his direction. I watch as his eyebrows raise, my sudden meanness taking him by surprise.

I’m sorry, he says, looking embarrassed. "It’s just—I thought you might be interested. In telling the story. Your story. On the show."

Thank you, I say, trying to soften my tone. We both tilt back as the plane begins to ascend, the floor rattling violently beneath our feet. But I’ll pass.

Okay, he says, digging into his pocket and pulling out his wallet. I watch as he flips open the faded leather, pulls a business card out, and places it gently on my leg. If you change your mind.

I close my eyes again, leaving his card untouched on my knee. We’re in the air now, ripping through clouds bloated with water, a beam of sunlight occasionally finding its way through the half-drawn shade and casting a ray of bright light across my eyes.

I guess I just thought that’s why you do it, he adds softly. I try to ignore him, but curiosity gets the best of me. I can’t.

Do what?

You know, your talks. It can’t be easy, reliving it over and over again. But you have to if you want to keep the case alive. If you ever want it to be solved.

I squeeze my eyes harder, focusing on the little spider veins I can see in my eyelids, glowing red.

But with a podcast, you wouldn’t have to talk to all those people. Not directly, anyway. You’d just have to talk to me.

I swallow, nod my head gently to indicate that I hear but that the conversation is still over.

Anyway, just think it over, he adds, reclining his chair.

I can hear the rustling of his jeans as he tries to get comfortable, and I know, within minutes, he’ll be able to do so easily what I haven’t been able to do in a year. I peek one eye open and glance in his direction. He’s pushed wireless headphones into his ears, the steady thumping of bass loud enough for me to hear. Then I watch his body transform the same way it always does, predictable yet still so foreign to me: His breath begins to get deeper, steadier. His fingers begin to twitch in his lap, his mouth hanging open like a creaky cupboard door, a single bead of drool quivering in the corner of his lip. Five minutes later, a gentle snore erupts from his throat, and I feel a pinch in my jaw as I clench my teeth.

Then I close my eyes, imagining, for a fleeting moment, what it must be like.

CHAPTER THREE

I push my key into the front door, twisting.

It’s nearly two in the morning, and my trip home from the airport is nothing more than a blur, like those long-exposure photographs that feature busy commuters with trails of color following them around the train station. After landing at Hartsfield-Jackson, I had grabbed Waylon’s business card and tucked it into my purse, picking up my things and pushing toward the exit without so much as a goodbye. Then I ran to my gate, hopped onto my connection, and took another forty-five-minute flight into the Savannah/Hilton Head International Airport, my eyes boring into the seat in front of me the whole way home. I barely remember staggering through baggage claim, hailing a taxi outside the terminal. Letting the car lull me into a kind of trance for another forty minutes before being dropped in my driveway, stumbling up the steps toward home.

I hear my dog whining as soon as the key begins to turn. I already know where to find him: sitting just inside the front door, tail wagging furiously against the hardwood like a feather duster. He’s always been mouthy, Roscoe, ever since he was a puppy. I envy his ability to hold on to the things that make him him, unchanged.

Sometimes, when I look in the mirror, I don’t even recognize myself anymore. I don’t even know who I am.

Hey, you, I whisper, rubbing his ears. I missed you.

Roscoe emits a low groan from somewhere deep in his throat, his nails pawing at my leg. My neighbor takes care of him when I’m gone: an older woman who pities me, I think—that, or she really needs the twenty dollars a day I leave for her on the countertop. She lets him outside, fills his bowl. Leaves meticulous notes about his bathroom schedule and eating habits. I don’t feel bad about leaving him, to be honest, because she gives him more of a routine than I do.

I drop my purse on the counter and thumb through the mail she left in a pile, mostly junk and bills, until I feel a catch in my throat. I pick up an envelope addressed in familiar script, my parents’ address in the left-hand corner, and flip it over, sticking my thumb in the gap and ripping it open. I pull out a small card with flowers on the front; when I open it up, a check flutters out and falls to the floor.

I drop the card on the counter, exhaling slowly. I can’t bring myself to touch the check, to see how much it’s for. Not yet, anyway.

Are you ready for a walk? I ask Roscoe instead. He spins in a circle, an undeniable yes, and I feel myself smile. That’s the beauty of animals—they adapt.

Ever since I’ve become nocturnal, Roscoe has, too.

I remember looking up at Dr. Harris, nine months ago, during our first appointment. The first of many. I couldn’t see my eyes, but I could feel them. Tight, stinging. I knew they were bloodshot, the little veins that were supposed to be invisible branching out across my sclera like a windshield after a wreck, bloodied and cracking. Broken beyond repair. No matter how many times I blinked, they never got better. It was almost as if my eyelids were made of sandpaper, chipping away at my pupils with each flip of the lid.

When was the last time you got a full, uninterrupted night of rest? he had asked. Can you recall?

Of course I could. Of course I could recall. I would be recalling that date for the rest of my life, no matter how hard I tried to push it out of my memory. No matter how hard I tried to will it out of existence, how desperately I wanted to pretend that it was just a nightmare. A terrible, horrible nightmare I would be waking up from at any minute now. Any second.

Sunday, March sixth.

That’s a long time, he had said, glancing down at the clipboard on his desk. Three months.

I nodded. One thing I was starting to notice about being awake all the time was the way in which seemingly little things grew bigger by the day. Noisier, harder to ignore. The ticking of the clock in the corner was deafening, like a long nail steadily tapping against glass. The dust in the air was unusually visible, little specks of lint floating slowly across my field of vision like someone had tampered with my settings, distorting everything into high-contrast slow motion. I could smell the remnants of Dr. Harris’s lunch, little particles of canned tuna wafting through his office and into my nostrils, fishy and brackish, making my esophagus squeeze.

Did anything extraordinary happen that night?

Extraordinary.

Until I had woken up the next morning, there hadn’t been anything extraordinary about it. It had been painfully ordinary, in fact. I remember changing into my favorite pair of pajamas, pushing my hair back with a headband, and scrubbing the makeup from my skin. And then I had put down Mason, of course. I had read him a story, rocking him to sleep the way I always did, but for the life of me, I couldn’t remember which story it was. I remember standing in his bedroom, days later, after the yellow police tape had been snipped from the doorway, the silence of his nursery somehow making the room seem to expand to triple its actual size. I remember standing there, staring at his bookshelf—at Goodnight Moon and The Very Hungry Caterpillar and Where the Wild Things Are, desperately trying to remember which one it was. What my last words to my son had been.

But I couldn’t. I couldn’t remember. That’s how ordinary it was.

Our son, Ben had interjected, placing his hand on my knee. I looked over at my husband, remembering that he was there. He was taken that night from his bedroom. While we were sleeping.

Dr. Harris had to have known, of course. The entire state of Georgia had known—the entire country, even. Then he had bowed his head the way most people seemed to do when they realized their mistake and didn’t know what else to say, his neck mimicking the snap of a shutting lid. Conversation closed.

But Izzy has always had … problems, Ben continued. Suddenly, I felt like I was in detention. "With sleep. Even before the insomnia. Kind of the opposite problem,

Reviews for All the Dangerous Things

[Sheena Perron · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

This is a gripping mystery/thriller that kept me hooked from start to finish. I thought I had it figured out. So good!

[roshreviews · Rating: 2 out of 5 stars]

In a Nutshell: A slow, slow, slow “thriller”. Worth it for the final resolution, but the journey to reach that point was eye-roll-inducing. I’m making it official: I am tired of 1st person unreliable narrators that ramble too much and trust only themselves.

Story Synopsis:
Isabelle Drake’s toddler son Mason was kidnapped a year ago. She hasn’t slept since. The case is now cold, with no clues and no leads for the police. Even her marriage is over, not being able to stand the strain of a missing child. Isabelle tries to keep the investigation active by speaking about Mason at true crime cons. At one such event, she bumps into a crime podcaster who wants to highlight Mason in his next show. But as they proceed with this, Isabelle starts questioning her own memories of what happened that night.
The story comes to us in the first person perspective of Isabelle from ‘Now’ and ‘Then’ timelines.


Where the book worked for me:

[maydacat_1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Isabelle’s life changed overnight. Her young son, Mason, was taken from his room while his parents slept. Now, she can’t sleep, her marriage has failed, and her sole mission is to find her son, no matter what she has to do to accomplish that goal. She does interviews with podcasters and true crime reporters. One year later, she is no further along. Then she is approached by a podcaster who just might be able to help. This thriller is a quick read, mostly because you won’t be able to stop reading once you start. The characters come alive on the page; you will feel Isabelle’s anguish at the loss of her son. It’s a well crafted story, with an ending you might have to read twice to believe.

[carol420 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Isabelle Drake was once a lifestyle reporter for The Grit but she turned freelancer so she could marry the Grit publisher, Ben Drake, without causing too much controversy. Poor woman hadn’t slept more than an hour or so a night since her 18-month-old son, Mason, was taken from his crib as she and Ben slept only a few yards away. Since then, her entire existence has been a tireless pursuit of endless leads that result in nothing. She even begins taking her frustrations out on bystanders...once breaking the nose of a supermarket cashier that she had learned had a criminal record. The detective working the case, Det. Arthur Dozier with the Savannah Police Department has repeatedly warned her to stay out of, and away from, the case. She's exhausted from lack of sleep and from her constant travels to all the true-crime conventions across the region, telling the story of her little lost boy and the breakup of her marriage that followed, hoping that someone, somewhere, might know something. Isabelle eagerly agrees to tell her story to a podcaster, Waylon Spencer, thinking that he could spread it more widely. However, she only finds that the questions he asks to be unsettling...so much so that she begins to wonder if maybe she herself could have been the one responsible for Mason’s disappearance...and also what her role might have been in another family calamity that took place more than 20 years earlier that was swept under the rug because her father was a South Carolina congressman from a long line of congressmen. The conclusion to this story was nothing even resembling neat and orderly. There were multiple mysteries that ended up requiring a host of multiple suspects.... entirely too many. The author was relentless in linking Isabelle’s lack of sleep to her waking nightmare...something that I admit allows readers allows readers to easily relate to and sympathize with this woman. Even though Isabelle's nights are sleepless...her nightmares are many and continuous.

[enid007 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

How can I rave about this book without overly hyping it or giving away spoilers... I have no clue but here I will attempt to do so.

This book had me hooked from beginning to end. I was so into it that I normally with thrillers or mysteries I am trying to figure out who did what and why and how but with All The Dangerous Things I was just in the story, fully zoned into it if at all possible and almost to involved. This was so intense that I felt my pulse go higher with every moment Isabelle had to endure. Highly recommend if you love a good mystery thriller. This one is a chef's kiss.

[gac53 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

I rarely give a 5 star rating. This book deserved it. So many twists and turns; and all are believable. I expected the ending but was surprised at the "complete" ending. Highly recommend this book.

[zmagic69 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

This is the second book I have read by this author and like the first one it just didn’t click for me.
In this story the main character is also a total basket case, and it takes forever for the important details to come out, many of which you know are coming because nothing ever adds up. I think you need to be a woman to sympathize or relate to this authors main characters because I definitely don’t.

[jacsun · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Beautifully written, this is a stimulating thriller which takes place in the southern town of Savannah where the main character, Isabelle, lives. The description sets the stage with its giant oak trees, the mysterious marsh with minnows at her feet and the smell of Pluff mud, a "familiar stench of something rotten.” At night she sees all kinds of critters including raccoons searching for food in someone's trash.

The story is narrated by Isabelle from 1999 when she was growing up in a very old mansion in Beaufort to the present day. She tries to make sense of what happened in her life when her sister at age six died from an accident in the middle of the night. She was eight years old and her father, Congressman Henry Rhett, told her to say as little as possible to the detective while her mother kept quiet. In their house, they talked about politics and religion. Yet, emotions and feelings were set aside.

Now Isabelle is feeling a great amount of distress. Her son, Mason, went missing at 18 months while sleeping in the middle of the night and nobody could tell her what happened. Her husband, Ben, was no help to her. After a short time afterwards, he told her she needed to move on and then he left her. She hasn’t been able to sleep since and the detective isn’t much help. With a history of sleepwalking as a child, she has been getting help from a therapist. She needs to know: who did this? Her worst fear is: if she did it or, did a neighbor?

I am usually pretty good about predicting the endings with hints along the way but this story sneaked up on me. The most interesting part for me was reading the “Author’s Note.” She makes it clear not to read this until the end of the story. When I did, it was like: wow; a revelation about women in general made sense. This book with a release date of January 10, 2023 will make many of my book friends from the Low Country feel right at home.

My thanks to Stacy Willingham, St. Martin’s Press and NetGalley for allowing me to read an advanced copy of this book.

[booklover1801 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

Isabelle Drake has not had a good night's sleep since her eighteen-month-old baby, Mason, was abducted from his crib. "All the Dangerous Things," by Stacy Willingham, is set in Savannah, Georgia. Isabelle narrates her tale of woe that began during her childhood in Beaufort, South Carolina. In those days, she and her younger sister, Margaret, relied on one another for companionship. Their flighty mother spent hours painting in her studio, and their father, a member of the U. S. Congress, was rarely home. Now that Isabelle and her husband have separated, she spends her time hounding the police, conducting her own investigation, and telling her story in public to true crime enthusiasts. She hopes that, sooner or later, someone will come forward with information about Mason's disappearance.

This story has a chilling Southern Gothic flavor. Isabelle is a troubled woman who has been known to get up in the middle of the night and walk around in a daze. She wonders whether, during her nocturnal wanderings, she could have harmed her adorable but fussy baby without realizing it. Although Isabelle has visited a therapist, there are crucial portions of her past that she cannot remember.

Readers will question Isabelle's sanity, especially when our heroine recalls the blazing hot and disastrous summer of 1999 that left her with lasting emotional scars. This sinister tale of psychological suspense has evocative descriptive writing, a creepy setting (the dense and malodorous marshes are particularly menacing); and a great deal of hand-wringing. The author's contrived, over-the-top, but clever finale demonstrates that erroneous assumptions can lead to a great deal of suffering. We wonder: Can the troubled Isabelle ever regain her peace of mind after all that she has endured? Moreover, how is it possible to achieve justice in a world where so many villains go unpunished?

[khoyt-43756 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

A truly great read. It was a page-turner with twists and turns that continued to surprise. It was also a look into motherhood, believe-it-or-not, that felt real. The reader is drawn into the story through the wonderful prose of the storyteller. I will put her next novel on my TBR list!

[amcheri-1 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

What a fun ride! While I did guess some of the big reveals early on, there were enough twists to keep me engaged and surprised. And the narrator did a fantastic job.

If you're looking for a good, twisty domestic thriller, give this one a try. I enjoyed the shit out of this book!

Thanks to the publisher and NetGalley for a copy of the audiobook.

[dianekeenoy · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

My last book of 2022 and it was a good one! I have the author's first book A Flicker in the Dark in one of my TBR piles so I will move it up!

[jhscolloquium · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

The inspiration for All the Dangerous Things was an idea that came to author Stacy Willingham one day. "What would it feel like to be trapped inside the mind of a sleep-deprived mother who, deep down, believed that the disappearance of her child was somehow her fault?" Not yet a mother herself, Willingham says she pondered why a mother would feel that way until she realized that women and, in particular, mothers, "are conditioned from birth to feel guilty about something. We always think things are our fault. We always feel the need to apologize: for being too much or too little. Too loud or too quiet. Too driven or too content. For wanting children more than anything or for not even wanting them all." Willingham confesses that she was afraid to pen a book focused on motherhood, so she did a lot of research on the subject. And was dismayed to discover that many women don't express their emotions because of the guilt they feel about experiencing them. Which is actually tragic because their emotions are largely universal. "We feel completely alone in an experience that's shared by so many," Willingham observes, which propelled her to create the variety of female characters featured in All the Dangerous Things who are "flawed, complicated, messy . . ."

In a compelling first-person narrative, Isabelle Drake reveals at the outset of the story that her life changed exactly one year ago when her son, Mason, was kidnapped. And -- unimaginably -- during that year, she has not had "a single night of rest." Despite trying sleeping pills, eye drops, caffeine, and therapy, Isabelle is only able to "microsleep" for two to twenty seconds at a time, so she has been "stumbling through life in a semiconscious dream state" for a full three hundred and sixty-four days. Nonetheless, she is still "no closer to the truth." She is a wreck -- physically and mentally.

Although it is emotionally draining for her, Isabelle travels to true crime conferences and conventions at which she speaks about Mason's unsolved case. She does it because she hopes that an audience member might be able to shed light on Mason's whereabouts and, in exchange for her participation, is provided a list of the attendees' names and addresses. When she returns home, she studies those lists and researches the backgrounds of her audience members in search of even the most attenuated clues.

Willingham also performed extensive research on sleepwalking and found that about one-third of children sleepwalk at some point during their childhood. And about two percent of them continue doing so in adulthood. Isabelle explains that she has always been a heavy sleeper and, as a child, sleepwalked from time to time. Now, suffering from severe insomnia, she recalls moments from her childhood for which she lacks a cogent explanation. She grew up in a house near a marsh, and there were nights when she woke up disoriented, confused. Inexplicably, there were muddy footprints on the carpet. Her younger sister, Margaret, mysteriously drowned in the marsh one night. Mason's stuffed dinosaur was found on the banks of the marsh near their home. Isabelle is haunted by the "similarities between then and now" and "the icy silence from my parents that never seems to melt." (She is virtually estranged from her parents, although they do send her checks that she is loath to cash, even though she needs the money to cover her living expenses so that she can keep searching for Mason.) The detective assigned to the case has always made her uncomfortable because, of course, when Mason went missing, both she and her husband, Ben, immediately came and have remained under suspicion.

Unlike Isabelle, Ben quickly moved on with his life after Mason disappeared. He bought a condominium near his office, leaving Isabelle in the house they shared, and is in a new romantic relationship. Isabelle describes how they met, worked together after Ben hired her, and married quickly after his first wife's tragic suicide. She details their journey to parenthood, and how their marriage began falling apart before Mason was born, and collapsed fully under the strain of Mason's kidnapping.

She meets Waylon Spencer on a flight home from a conference at which she again related her story. He explains that his popular podcast led to the closure of a cold case and, despite her misgivings, she contacts him later and agrees to grant him access to all the information she has amassed about Mason's case . . . and her life. As he interviews her for the podcast and his inquiries grow increasingly intrusive and accusatory, Isabelle grows increasingly suspicious of Waylon and his motives. Is he really an ally?

The centerpiece of the story is Isabelle's fear that she may have harmed her own child. After all, one of her neighbors insists that he observed her walking past his house in the middle of the night, but she has no recollection of doing so. She reviews every moment of the video footage from the baby monitor in Mason's room to see if she entered his room during the night while he was sleeping but was eft with no memory of doing so. She believed her sleepwalking stopped when she was in college. But has she continued to sleepwalk, right up to the night Mason was taken? She doubts herself even to the point of pondering whether she might be capable of homicidal sleepwalking, an exceedingly rare, but scientifically documented phenomenon. Her therapist explains that it is possible for sleepwalkers to do "terrible things, that they would never do if they were awake. They can't differentiate between right and wrong" because the upper frontal lobe of the brain is asleep during sleepwalking.

Willingham deftly portrays a woman terrified by the possibility that she lost control over her own behavior to the point that she harmed her own child. She loved Mason more than anything, and cannot really conceive that she could be capable of such a heinous act. She is desperate to find any other plausible explanation, any scrap of evidence that will lead her to answers and, hopefully, her son -- alive and well. But her guilt is not so limited. Because she is his mother and it was her job to protect Mason, and she feels the judgment of everyone in her life, as well as many of those strangers who listen to her relate the story at those conferences and conventions. After all, Mason's bedroom window was open; the batteries in the baby monitor were dead. She also feels guilt about her feelings prior to Mason's kidnapping. Being a full-time mother can be an isolating and disappointing experience, especially for a woman who had a successful career as a journalist an misses working and having a social life, as well as a husband who found her interesting and desirable. And there is the strain of being constantly and relentlessly needed and depended upon by your child. It is fear, guilt, and ruminating about the past that keep Isabelle from sleeping, and she knows time is running out because human beings cannot survive without sleep indefinitely. She is conscious of the fact that she is becoming increasingly paranoid, and unable to discern what is real from what she imagines.

All the Dangerous Things is a tautly-crafted, tense, and absorbing mystery that is, at times, difficult to read. Because as Willingham examines her protagonist's deepest fears, Isabelle is relatable and empathetic. After all, the idea of being so out of control and beyond one's moral boundaries that one could be capable of committing unspeakable acts is horrifying and terrifying. Isabelle's angst and self-doubt are palpable and affecting, even as Willingham inspires readers to view her with suspicion while injecting clues to Mason's whereabouts at expertly-timed intervals. Isabelle is surrounded by other female characters who are empathetic and compelling, especially Isabelle's mother whose story Willingham unravels compassionately. The mystery around which Isabelle's misery revolves is plausibly constructed, and the conclusion shocking. All the Dangerous Things is almost suffocatingly atmospheric, which heightens the dramatic tension. It is engrossing, solidly entertaining, and ideal for readers who enjoy slow burning mysteries.

Thanks to NetGalley for an Advance Reader's Copy of the book.

[rmarcin-630843 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Isabelle Drake's son Mason was taken from his crib one year ago. Now, Isabelle can't sleep, her marriage to Ben is over, and Isabelle travels giving talks about the kidnapping hoping for a break in the case.
As Isabelle faces what happens, she remembers what happened to her younger sister, Margaret, when they were children. She also recalls how she would sleepwalk, and how it scared Margaret. Now, Isabelle wonders, did she do it again?
A podcaster approaches Isabelle asking her to discuss the case with him, so that they can try to find Mason. However, she starts to wonder about his interest in the case, which seems excessive.
This novel addresses motherhood, and the pressure to be a great mom. However, I think the conclusion may surprise you.

[celticlady53 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

All the Dangerous Things by Stacy Willingham is the story of Isabelle and her loss. Her son, Mason, has been missing for over a year, he was a year and a half at the time. The case has not been solved, much to Isabell's confusion. She had hoped that after all this time that someone somewhere would have seen or heard something.

There was an open window in Mason's room but no dirt on the floor or prints on the window or any sign that this was how the intruder came in. Isabelle is prone to sleepwalking and after viewing the video on the baby monitor, which was not working on the night of the disappearance, she starts thinking that she somehow had something to do with it. She sees on the video that she just stands over Mason's bed and stares at him. She of course remembers none of this.

In flashbacks we learn that about Isabelle's childhood and the death of her little sister Margaret. Margaret was two years younger than Isabelle and idolized her big sister. In the heat of summer, a very hot summer, Isabelle comes downstairs one morning and finds her parents distraught, and they tell her that Margaret is dead, died in the swamp. Isabelle is haunted by her sister's death all her adult life. She had been seeing a counselor to help her come to grips with what happened, but she often wonders if she had something to do with it.

Back to present, we learn about Isabelle and her husband Ben's relationship, how they met and how they ended up getting married. Turns out that Ben is able to move on after the disappearance of his son, but Isabelle is not, thus they split. She even gives talks hoping that someone in the audience somewhere knows something.

On one of her trips from a talk, on the plane a man, Waylon, starts talking to her. He is a podcaster and is interested in interviewing Isabelle. They hit it off and she starts talking with him about the case. He tells her one day that he needs to leave as it is costly staying in a motel. She invites him into her home because she wants to continue with the podcast. But things are not as they seem with Waylon, and she finds out that he is not who he says he is.

This book is a psychological thriller at its best, lots of twists and turns to keep the reader engaged. I really enjoy this type of book and this one was really good!

It is kind of interesting how different people react to the same circumstances. Not going to say anymore as I don't want to ruin it. I give these one 5 stars! Go get your copy!

[flowerchildreads · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Are you looking for a reading slump buster, something to jumpstart January? This is your book reader friends! One year after Isabel Drake’s toddler son disappeared in the night from his nursery police appear no closer to an answer, her marriage disintegrated, and she hasn’t slept a single night. Taking matters into her own hands she’s speaking at true crime events, searching faces for unusual interest, combing the ugliness of internet chats for any clue. Desperate, she agrees to speak with a true crime podcaster in the hopes of reaching more people. This is the story of a mother who is living through a waking nightmare, who is discounted and undermined, and has a past. Willingham deftly serves up a narrative where we don’t know if Isobel is an unreliable narrator, we are unsure who to believe, who to trust. The pacing is fantastic and drew me in immediately, I needed to know how past informed present, where all the pieces fit!
I highly recommend for lovers of suspense, and think this is very well suited for a buddy read. This is my first book from Stacy Willingham but I’m now excited to go back and read A Flicker In The Dark.
Thank you to Minotaur Books, Stacy Willingham, and Netgalley for the Advanced Reader Copy.

[lostinalibrary · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

A year ago, Isabelle’s eighteen-month-old son, Mason, went missing while she slept soundly and the disappearance remains unsolved. Since that night, she has only been able to sleep for moments at a time. She and her husband, Ben, have divorced and she devotes her time to making the rounds of true crime shows, in an effort to keep the case open and in the public eye despite the fact that many think she’s just seeking fame or, worse, she is responsible.

All the Dangerous Things is a psychological thriller written by Stacy Williamson and, for the most part, I really enjoyed it. There are plenty of twists and turns but the story did seem to drag a bit at the beginning as we learn more about the events leading up to the disappearance as well as well as events from Isabelle’s past. But the ending makes it well worth the wait. Overall, once it gets going, a very interesting and compelling read.

Thanks to Netgalley and the publishers for the opportunity to read this book in exchange for an honest review

[carolesrandomlife · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

I liked this one! I am a huge fan of twisty thrillers so I was more than eager to dive into this book. I was hooked by this book right away and found it incredibly hard to set aside. I wanted to know what really happened to Mason, not to mention the events from Isabelle’s childhood. The narrator really took the story to the next level with her excellent narration. I am so glad that I decided to give this book a try.

Isabelle hasn’t slept since her toddler son, Mason, was taken from his bedroom a year earlier. She may have had a few catnaps but she hasn’t had any real rest. She doesn’t plan to stop until she finds out what happened to her son. The book takes us through the events leading up to that including her relationship with Mason’s father. We also see what she is doing now to try to find out who took her son. There is a second timeline set in the past that explores events from Isabelle’s childhood that I found to be equally captivating.

I really felt for Isabelle because of everything that she has been through but I wasn’t sure if I should trust her. The more we learned about the events leading to Mason’s disappearance, the more questions I had. There were a lot of things that I needed answers to and I couldn’t put the book down until I knew all of the answers. I did need some time to process the story when I finished it because I wasn’t entirely sold by the twists at the end, and I am still not. That said, I did really enjoy the story as a whole.

Karissa Vacker did a remarkable job with the narration of this book. I am completely convinced that my enjoyment of this book was greatly increased by her narration. I thought that the various voices that she used in the story worked really to bring the characters to life. I found her voice to be quite pleasant and easy to listen to for hours at a time. I really felt like she helped to provide an excellent listening experience.

I would recommend this book to others. This is a story that draws the reader in quickly and keeps them hooked until the final page. I think that a lot of readers are going to enjoy this thrilling book packed with twists and turns.

I received a review copy of this audiobook from Macmillan Audio.

[twink_2 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

I really enjoyed Stacy Willingham's debut novel, A Flicker in the Dark, last year and was excited to see she had written a second book. All the Dangerous Things is another excellent suspense novel.

Isabelle's young son Mason was taken from his bedroom in the night a year ago. After all that time, the case has gone cold for the police. But not for Isabelle - she's made it her job at the cost of her marriage and her health. She doesn't sleep, just catnaps and blackouts. When a podcaster asks to interview her, she says yes. Who knows - maybe someone will hear it and have information.

But he makes her nervous. He's asking questions about herself, her own past, her actions, her marriage and more. Isabelle begins to doubt herself on many fronts.

Willingham slowly reveals Isabelle's past through a then and now timeline. There's lots of unexpected twists and turns in the past points of view that creep their way into the present. What is real? What truly happened? Willingham does a great job of building the tension of the book with each new uneasy interaction, revelation and unsettling memory. I love unreliable narrators and Isabelle is definitely one of those. It's fun reading to try and find the truth amongst the misdirection. If you love twists and turns like I do, you'll find some good ones here! I was easily caught up in All The Dangerous Things. And the ending? Completely did not see that coming. I appreciate being surprised!

Now, I chose to listen to All the Dangerous Things. The narrator is Karissa Vacker, an award winning reader I've enjoyed previously. She has a lovely, somewhat gravelly undertone to her voice that is really pleasant to. She speaks clearly and enunciates well. I am so impressed at the voices she uses for male characters. She flips back and forth between characters and you'd swear there was more than one reader presenting the book. She has captured Willingham's plotting and does an excellent job of capturing the emotions and action.

[fredreeca · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

Isabelle has not slept in over a year except for a cat nap or two. Her son was stolen out of her home and she has now changed her focus. All of her focus is strictly on finding her child. She will not rest until she knows what happened Mason. But her own childhood is not innocent, so she begins questioning herself and what actually happened the evening Mason was taken.

There are a lot of moving parts to this novel and the moment you think you know…you don’t know!

I loved Isabelle. My heart broke for her and her situation. And then when she starts to question her ability as a mom…geez! Then, when you actually find out about her past and what happened the night Mason went missing…it makes your blood boil!

I loved this author’s previous book, A Flicker in the Dark. But this one, I fluctuated between 4 and 5 stars. I decided on 5 because the ending is so good. It does have some slow places and mundane details but that is by design. I did listen to it. I have more patience with a slow burn that way as well.

The narrator, Karissa Vacker, nailed all the characters. She has just the right tone with Isabelle too. You can definitely hear the heartbreak in her voice.

Need a story which will have you seeing red…THIS IS IT! Grab your copy today!

I received this novel from the publisher for a honest review.

[jmoura01 · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

4.5 Stars -- Wow, this book, what a nail biter! Stacy Willingham’s All the Dangerous Things is a thrilling second novel. It’s the story of Isabelle Drake, a chronic insomniac with a missing child and a dark secret from her childhood. The tension keeps building throughout the book as you try to figure out who is lying and what happened, now and then. Willingham is truly a gifted writer of suspense.

I received a complimentary copy of this book. Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own.
Thank you to NetGalley and St. Martin’s Press for this ARC.