"Even scarier than being consigned unjustly to a mental hospital for nine years is the prospect of being put out of it, back into a world with which you are no longer engaged. Caroline Hill had a baby when she was 17, a daughter who was torn from her arms at birth by people who claimed to know what was best for her. Caroline fell into a depression so deep that a mental hospital seemed the only place for her. While she was there her parents died in an accident, and as there was no other family, Caroline stayed on in care for year after year.
Eventually the darkness lifts from Caroline's mind enough for her medical supervisors to feel she can be returned to the wider world. Also, the state is trying to cut costs, so the more people it can move out of the wards, the better. (You can see that in real life on the streets of any major city.)
For someone whose mental health has been so hard won back after years of illness, being kidnapped by a madman is about the worst thing that could happen. Fortunately, Caroline's long incarceration has given her much insight into what makes mad people tick, and this serves her well during a harrowing road trip-but what will happen at the end of the trip?
This book makes for compelling reading, perhaps even more so if you know anything about how state mental institutions operate now and in the past. You might want to sleep with the light on for a few nights." ~ Karen Treanor, New Mystery Reader
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