It was if very fast-paced suspenseful read but this author has a habit of hiding the bad guys in with the good guys. So that part was predictable again in the story and the twist and turns were exposing those bad guys in with the good guys.
I enjoy his writing and how it kept me turning page after page trying to figure out the outcome. No one was safe and Berni was very unpredictable.

An absolutely superb thriller, one of the best I've read in a very long time. It has a solid narrative structure with just the right degree of propulsion to keep people turning pages, but what really makes it work so well is the believable characters and the natural dialogue. It's just a wonderfully written book in every respect. The only thing wrong with it in my view is that I didn't write it.

When it is published, it will be my pleasure to recommend it to my newsletter subscribers. Thank you for providing me with an ARC.

Jordan Briggs is a morning talk show host with a huge audience for her brash, straight talk. One morning while stuck in traffic on her way to her studio in the Siriusxm building she has minutes until airtime and abandons her car in the middle of the street. Cole, a homicide detective who has been assigned to the traffic division after angering his boss sees her and leaves his car to chase Jordan down and ends up being caught in the middle of everything that comes next.
While Jordan is answering callers she gets one from a man who gives his name as “Bernie” and invites her to “ play a game” and asks her to choose between Uber and NY taxis. Her choice leads to Bernie setting off bombs and a day of death, destruction and chaos.
Cole is on his way back to the patrol car when the first bombs go off and is drawn into the investigation. How do murders in Brooklyn, New Jersey and the bombings tie in with the controversial radio host and the Senator who is her guest?
J.D. Barker is an author that I do not need to know what his next book is about, I just know I can’t wait to read it and this is no exception. This draws you in from the very first page and is one of those times where you empathize with the “ bad guy”.
Thank you to #netgalley and the publisher for the advanced e-book in exchange for my honest opinion.

Jordan Briggs is a satellite radio talk show host who doesn't shy away from controversy. Her pursuit for success hasn't come without a cost: an estranged relationship with her mother, a divorce, and a list of people who hate her. Her career and daughter Charlotte seem to be the only things she is capable of holding together. When a man calls the show and asks Jordan to play a game she doesn't think much about it. The game quickly turns deadly with each call broadcasting live to thousands of listeners. Jordan is forced to play the game; with each of her decisions having deadly consequences and pointing to those she has wronged in her past. She will have to play his game in order to stop him before he takes everyone she loves from her.

A Caller's Game was a fantastic, intense, edge of my seat, thrill ride. This novel had me hooked from the first chapter and I couldn't put it down. Jordan is a powerful career driven woman who willing to sacrifice others to get to the top. You don't want to like her but at the same time you can start to see where she is coming from, especially as the story unfolds. The caller, "Bernie", is a man with a vengeance, a very scary man who has no problem killing others to make Jordan suffer the consequences of her actions. Cole is a detective who happens to cross paths with Jordan and gets pulled into Bernie's game. The plot compared this novel to "Talk Radio meets Die Hard" and I would definitely agree that Cole is the "John McClane" of this novel. My only complaint was that Charlotte's character is eleven but comes across as much younger in my opinion. I kept seeing her as a feisty eight year old...not much of a complaint. I also found the authors notes noteworthy as he described his thoughts writing this novel during the start of the COVID pandemic and how he writes his stories as entertainment i.e. an escape from reality; which is exactly why I read so much fiction in 2020...so thank you J.D. Barker for entertaining me. A must read for 2021!

I always can count on J.D. Barker to provide me with hours of fun, intense scenes, and characters that are fully developed. Although The Caller's Game had a bit less pizazz, it still set a fire of explosions and the wonder of who the mastermind was that had Jordan Briggs, a very in your face talk show host, jumping through hoops to stop the dastardly villain as he kills and threatens the things that mean something dear to Jordan.

Jordan's life is a mess, estranged from her mother, seeing her marriage fall apart, worried about her daughter, Charlotte, makes for a very tense radio host. When a man calls in to the station and asks Jordan if she wants to play a game, she bites. Jordan is all about her ratings, her success, and her ability to repel guests because of her gritty and hard hitting questions and responses.

However, this game proposed by the caller, Bernie, will definitely provide some shocks awaiting her when she accepts the game. In her studio at the time, is a senator, and when the scenario takes off, Jordan, her crew and the workers in the Sirius Building in Manhattan find it a no fun and games play that Bernie has in mind.

Aided by a detective who seems to have ruffed a few feathers himself, the game takes on ominous proportions with people dying, bombs exploding, and general mayhem. It is a huge mess and as the clock tics down, the action picks up to an explosive conclusion.

Recommended to those who love action, adventure, and surprises. This book is due out on February 22, 2021.
Thanks to J.D. Barker, Hampton Creek Press, and NetGalley for an advanced copy.

This book is absolutely non-stop, the pacing is frenetic but the writing is so good that it is easy to keep up. I couldn't put it down...think Die Hard meets bitchy female shock jock.

Warning: Don't start this if you have a lot to do, it's impossible to put down.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for gifting me a copy, it was my pleasure to write an honest review.

Great book! Engaging from the beginning to the end. Looking forward to reading more by this author! Highly recommended!

A Caller’s Game by J.D. Barker is a thrilling ride right from page 1. This is a fast action book that felt a bit like “Die Hard” to me, which I have watched so many times.

The main character Jordan Briggs is a talk show host for SiriusXM, and the storyline has her running from start to finish

I have read a few books by J.D. Barker, and his style of writing, and character development is never disappointing.

Thank you to Goodreads, Author J.D. Barker and Hampton Creek Press
for my advanced copy to read and review

A caller's game was an amazing fast-paced thriller. I loved every page of it. It was told from two points of view. The radio DJ's point of view and the police officer's point of view. A great narrow vision that completely worked. Jordan Briggs is a popular talk show host for SiriusXM and while stuck in traffic she jumps out of her car to run to start her talk show. A police officer named Cole sees her jump out of her car and chases after her. While wrapped in that chase a series of events starts. It's a quick read.

It's a fast-paced action-packed read. I would recommend it to anyone into suspenseful thrillers with strong character development.

Wonderful, amazing, and very much put me in mind of of Die Hard / Midnight Caller!

5stars. He can do no wrong for me.

With thanks to Netgalley, publisher and author.

Another amazing plot from J.D Barker, quite Die Hard-esque!. Talk Radio host Jordan Briggs takes a call from Bernie and he asks her to play a game. The consequences of the games do not become prevalent until later and bombs starts going off around the city. With her daughter in the building, Jordan wants to keep her safe. The game continues with Jordan’s hand forced. And the doors to the past are opened.
Told from the perspective of Jordan and cop Cole Huntley. One you can easily read in one sitting.

It started as a typical day in the life of Jordan Briggs, a talk show radio host. Her ex-husband shows up at work with their daughter Charlotte, even though it is his turn to watch her. But Jordan is used to people letting her down and not pulling their weight. Just another typical day. How much is she supposed to endure from upper management who try and tell her how to do her job, or from her so, so staff. Charlotte seems to be the only person she actually cares about, but still, it is an inconvenience since she is supposed to visit her mother( for the first time in 15 years). It is not easy being Jordan, but this day will make her rethink everything.
When one of her listeners, Bernie, calls her show, she thinks she is dealing with another slightly demented caller. But when he suggests that they play a game, Jordan has no idea that her choices will lead to mayhem and murder. It seems as though Bernie has a score to settle with Jordan and before the day ends, she will have to fight to live to see another day.
One twist after the other is the best way that I can describe this nonstop thriller. None of JD Barker's books are slow burns; they always grab you from the first page and don't let go. Another great read by this author.

4.5

"Have you ever woken up in the middle of the night and wondered if this is it? If today is the day you'll die?"

Some say and believe that an eye for an eye will leave the whole world blind; but for some, blood for blood is the only way to cope with grief and lay their ghosts to rest.

Jordan Briggs, the ambitious and formidable host of a controversial radio talk-show, begins her day as usual, criticizing and bad-mouthing certain people and in a word being her usual self.
But when a caller calls asking her to play a game, she can't in her wildest nightmares imagine the price she is going to pay by opening this Pandora's Box.

Right from the beginning to the end, A Caller's Game is an action-packed, thrilling edge of your seat book.
This is my fifth 5-star book by the author. Keep them coming Mr. Barker!

Thanks to J.D. Barker, Hampton Creek Press and the NetGalley for my copy of the book.

JD Barker offers another of his twisted trademark overly fast paced, non-stop, pounding addictive thrillers, set amongst the skyscrapers of New York City and with echoes of the Die Hard series of movies. A female version of Howard Stern, controversial shock jock, Jordan Briggs, is not having a good morning, but she ain't seen nothing yet as she begins her SiriusXM morning show. She ignores advice when she makes the decision to take a call from Bernie, and with a live audience of millions on air, and with no inkling about the deadly nightmare that is about to unfold, agrees to participate in Bernie's game. NYPD Detective Cole Hundley is in the ignominious position of having to serve as a traffic cop as punishment as he gets drawn into a terrifying scenario as he tries to save lives.

Jordan is a blindly ambitious, toxic, offensive and brash woman, chasing the ratings war, self centred, with a popular show, but perhaps unsurprisingly, given her unsympathetic personality, a disaster of a personal life, that includes a failed marriage, all she has left is her precocious 11 year old daughter, Charlotte, who is herself a hard to like character. She finds herself making decisions, choices over which she has little understanding, but ones which have devastating consequences, a game in which her past comes back to savagely haunt her. In a heavily tense and suspenseful narrative, a killer seeks revenge, there are bombs and twists galore, a cat and mouse chase, as you wonder just how many will die.

The is a entertaining read, although you will have to suspend your sense of disbelief, and the relentless pace did wear me down on occasion, but a thriller that I think will appeal to many of Barker's diehard fans, not to mention other crime and thriller readers. Many thanks to Hampton Creek Press for an ARC.

I was prepared to say something snarky, as I'm me and even if I like something I just refuse to give an inch, but, if I'm honest, I skipped things I should be doing because I had to know what happened next. Plus the Author's note literally has me in tears, so.

So, part of my reaction to this book is “my bad.” As you guys may already know from my reading choices, I’m a feminist, so a book about a “female Howard Stern” (oy vey!) was pretty likely to annoy me. But I’d heard so many good things about JD Barker that I jumped at the chance to read this without paying too much attention to the plot past the blurb. (Just a suggestion: if the blurb made the Stern/shock jock inspiration a little more clear, the book might weed out likely-to-be-annoyed folks like me.) Nevertheless, the description of “Die Hard meets Talk Radio” is very accurate, and the book starts out with a bang, deftly introducing our main characters (a cop, a radio host, and a villain) in a terrorist situation. The setup is extremely interesting and drew me right in.

Now, I am a huge fan of Die Hard. My husband and I have matching Nakatomi Plaza Christmas Party shirts which we wear during the holidays when we rewatch Die Hard 1 and 2. So perhaps my expectations were too high hearing “Die Hard.” But I had a hard time swallowing some of the implausibilities required for the terrorist scenario at the heart of the book to work. In Die Hard, a team of folks did a lot of plausible planning that allowed them to execute their attack. Not really the same here.

Also, for the aforementioned reasons, I had a hard time rooting for Jordan, the talk show host, who I found pretty annoying. The plot twists were action-packed for sure, and fun, but somewhat outlandish. After the beginning, I lost some interest and had a tough time finishing this one. However, I can see from JD Barker’s writing that he can probably deliver a fast-paced and creative thriller with a different setup that I would enjoy. So I’ll give him another shot. This just probably was not an ideal plot for me.

Thanks to NetGalley, Hampton Creek Press and JD Barker for the advance copy!

This is my first time with J.D. Barker and it won't be the last. The writing is incredible, the are characters realistic and the action did not let up. I intended to get this started as my next read but I could not put it down. There was no good stopping point! About 3/4 of the way through, I was exhausted, but kept reading because I needed to know how it turned out.

The afterword was also a pleasure to read. Stay safe all.

A Caller's Game by J.D. Barker is one of the best reads I've enjoyed this year. If you're looking for dark, gripping, amazingly developed characters and plot, here you go. You won't be able to finish

A Caller’s Game by J.D. Barker. I read this book through NetGalley, and it is currently set to be released in February of 2021. My initial lure to this book was the cover, it looked very intriguing and the title was interesting. On first glance, this book looked and sounded like a nail biter, and it 110% did not disappoint!

Jordan Briggs is a controversial satellite radio talk show host that holds a spot high on the ratings board. Jordan is very outspoken and doesn’t much think about how her words and actions affect other people as long as it keeps her in the #1 spot. Jordan has also sacrificed her marriage and other family relationships to keep that spot. It seemed today was like any other day, but when Jordan takes a call from a seemingly harmless man who asks her to play a game, things quickly take a turn for the worse. Live on air and broadcasting to millions across the globe, Jordan is forced into a deadly game where she is no longer calling the shots. Jordan quickly learns that all decisions have consequences and the past has come back to haunt her, and might just cost her the one thing she values more than her ratings.

First we have our main character, Jordan Briggs. I did get slightly worried when our first introduction to Jordan was all about how expensive her car and shoes were, but this book moves so fast I was quick to forget those little annoyances (and in the end they play into the story). As much as she is an egotistical loudmouth with an uncanny ability to offend everyone, I see myself in this character. She is driven, knows her worth, and isn’t afraid to speak her mind. Did this get her into super trouble with a trigger happy terrorist? It sure did. But, did it also help through the main plot points and get her out safely on the other side? You’ll just have to read it for yourself and find out 

Then we have NYPD Officer John McClane. Wait, wrong story. I mean NYPD Officer Cole Hundley. It seemed very fitting that right before I chose this book I got a hankering to watch Die Hard. Cole really reminds me of McClane, mostly because they both have an uncanny ability to find themselves in the very wrong place at the very wrong time. Cole does some pretty awesome McClane/MacGyver stuff that keeps you on your toes and hoping our real time cops are trained that dang good.

The main reason I can’t give this one a full 5 stars is because the actions of the terrorist seem very far fetched and are never really explained. I think you will get my point when you read the book. He does some pretty crazy, intricate things with explosives that I find so hard to believe anyone in real life could pull off. I can’t go much farther into that because it would give away too much. I chose to ignore that feeling early on and just read the story as it was written and I think that made it better for me.

There are many other characters that go in and out of the story and really leave you wondering who is good and who is bad. It’s usually not too easy to fool me, but there was one good guy/bad guy switch that happened that completely threw me off so hats off to J.D. Barker on that one! All in all, this was a very fast moving book and once I got into it I really couldn’t put it down.

4 stars
Content Warning: Explosions, gun violence, and terrorist activity.

A well-known radio broadcaster, Jordan, is quite sarcastic and brash. Making "fun" of her call-ins on the show is just one of her "talents" She meets her match on air when a caller, "Bernie", gets back at her...

He tells Jordan that he has been on disability for 7 years. Jordan has her comments. But, when he begins mentioning her ex-husband and lifestyle - Jordan is chuffed.

However, when "Bernie" asks Jordan if she ever woke up in the middle of the night wondering if it will be the day she dies...

WOW! Grabbed me from the beginning and continued to hold my interest throughout the book.

EXCELLENT!

Many Thanks to Hampton Creek (IBPA) and NetGalley for a truly great read.