Blog Tour ‘Tall Oaks’ by Chris Whitaker

Today I’m excited to participate in the Blog Tour of
‘Tall Oaks’ by Chris Whitaker. ‘Tall Oaks’ is a Thriller Mystery and the
author’s debut novel. My tour stop contains a review of the book and an awesome guest post written by Chris called ‘Quitting my job to write Tall Oaks’. 

For fans of ‘Twin Peaks’ and ‘The Truth about the Harry
Quebert Affair’, this brilliant debut is dark yet hilarious, suspenseful and
sad.

Everyone has a secret in Tall Oaks . . .

When three-year-old Harry goes missing, the whole of America turns its
attention to one small town.

Everyone is eager to help. Everyone is a suspect.

Desperate mother Jess, whose grief is driving her to extreme measures.

Newcomer Jared, with an easy charm and a string of broken hearts in his wake.

Photographer Jerry, who’s determined to break away from his controlling mother
once and for all.

And, investigating them all, a police chief with a hidden obsession of his own
. . .

In Chris Whitaker’s brilliant and original debut novel, missing persons, secret
identities and dangerous lies abound in a town as idiosyncratic as its
inhabitants.  

Publication Date:	April 7th 2016
Series:	–
Genre:	Thriller, Mystery
Pages:	320
Formats:	eBook (Paperback will publish in September)
Available at:	Amazon

 

A view weeks ago I was approached to read ‘Tall Oaks’. I
never heard about this book before, but the book description and eye-popping
cover really made me interested in reading this book. It sounded like an
intriguing and thrilling read and as soon as it was possible I started reading.

What I love about ‘Tall Oaks’ is the way the story
immediately starts from the very first page. The police investigator Jim, is
listening to a tape on which a little boys mom tells him about the
disappearance of her three year old son. It was an intriguing way of starting a
book, and I felt like I was immediately in the middle of the story. It
definitely makes you want to keep on reading.

‘Tall Oaks’ is a story in which we see the point of view
of a lot of different characters, all living in the small town of Tall Oaks.
All these characters are affected by the disappearance of the little boy, and
they are all very different. Some characters are looking guilty just by the way
they are, some characters seem normal but have huge secrets. It’s all very
interesting to read.

This book was definitely a great debut novel. I loved
reading about all these different characters. I usually have trouble keeping a
lot of characters apart, but in this book I didn’t have that problem. These characters
were all so different that I could tell them apart very soon.

The only problem was that I received an Kindle version of
this book which somehow didn’t show a good ending to the end of paragraphs (or
maybe it was just part of the book?). There would only be a little blank space
and we would enter the story from another characters point of view. Because
there was only such a little space, I didn’t always realize I was already
reading another characters point of view. It was really confusing at times, but
thankfully the great writing made up for this. And I seriously have no idea if
it was just my kindle acting weird, or really the kindle edition.

Not only was this book, and it’s many characters
intriguing and thrilling to read, it was also really funny at times. For
example there is this kid who wants to be seen as a gangster, which makes him
act and do the most funniest things. This author really had a way of making
reading this book a really fun journey.

I would definitely recommend ‘Tall Oaks’. It’s really a
fun read and from the moment you start, you just don’t want to stop.

I’ve always loved writing. When I was a child an author
came in to my primary school to promote his latest offering and I remember
thinking that he had the best job in the world, he got to make up stories for a
living. It seemed like the kind of dream job so far out of reach that I didn’t
seriously consider it until years later.  

After leaving school I read an article in the newspaper
about a stockbroker and quickly decided it was a career worth pursuing (he had
a Ferrari). So I took my FSA exams, then cold called every financial
institution in London until I found a job.

Whilst I made some really great friends, and had some
really great nights out (channelling my inner Wolf of Wall Street) I always
knew deep down that it wasn’t what I wanted to do. Still, I stuck at it for ten
years, finding that once you’ve travelled a good distance down one career path,
turning around can be very a difficult thing to do.

It was when I turned thirty that I reached a crossroads. I’ve
heard other authors talking about the need to write, but never really
understood it until that point. It felt like the right time. I felt like I
needed to write, and not just for an hour here and there, working on half-finished
stories year after year. I needed to devote real time to it, to see if it was
something I might be good at.

I often think about the day I quit my job. I was horribly
nervous. I was walking away from a lot, ten years of groundwork had been laid
and the future was beginning to look relatively 
safe, financially at least. It was heart versus head.

I’d sat down with my wife,  talked it over, and we’d decided to make some
sacrifices. We lowered our expenditure (no more Fabergé eggs for breakfast) and
sold our flat and car in preparation. 

And so then I handed my notice in. It was scary, there
were lots of sleepless nights, but I hoped it would be worth it in the long
run. I still had a day job, trading from home, but suddenly found myself with
much more time to write. And write I did. Unfortunately I wrote some of the
worst fiction known to man. Page after page of it, hundreds of thousands of
words that were shredded as quickly as they were printed.

I thought I’d made a mistake. I thought I’d have to head
back into the city with my tail between my legs.

It was only when I gave some real thought to the type of
story I wanted to write, and the type of writer that I wanted to be, that I
made some progress. I began to work on the plot for Tall Oaks, aiming to write
a book as much about the quirky characters in a small town as it was a crime
novel with a missing child investigation at its heart. And as soon I began
writing the story it felt better, something clicked and I began to really enjoy
the process.

Now, having written a book I’m really proud of, I’m so
glad that I made the difficult decision to follow my dream.     

Chris Whitaker was born in London and spent ten years
working as a financial trader in the city. When not writing he enjoys football,
boxing, and anything else that distracts him from his wife and two young sons.
“Tall Oaks” is his first novel.

For more information about Chris Whitaker please visit
him on Twitter.

I received this book from Bonnier Publishing in exchange for my honest review.