A Phone Call Away by Rich Douek & Russell Mark Olson

Interestingly, the cover only credits the artist as Russell Olson, perhaps due to space and legibility issues. Full credit to this creative team for one of the best crime comics I’ve ever read, tho! And, given the sheer amount of crime fiction I read, that is saying a lot!

A Phone Call Away is the story of the Walker family, who survived the unimaginable to turn their grief into a fight for kids worldwide. Fourteen years ago, Emma and Andrew Walker were your typical young couple with a six year-old kid, Mandy. When Mandy was kidnapped and her mutilated body found a week later, the Walkers were catapulted into the national spotlight. Seizing the opportunity, the Walkers used the attention to build not only their careers but a charitable foundation named after their late daughter. After several years, they also had another child, Meghan, whose upbringing has been documented on their wildly popular reality TV show, Second Chances.

So when they go to wake Meghan on the morning of her sixth birthday and find her gone, it’s the worst kind of deja vu. Someone has clearly broken in and taken her, but who? As the cracks in their picture-perfect facade begin to widen, a group of people still affected by — if not downright obsessed with — what happened to Mandy fourteen years ago converge in order to uncover the truth… and hopefully save a little girl’s life in the process.

The pacing on this crime graphic novel was excellent as the viewpoint shifts from the Walker family to an odd couple whose involvement in the Mandy Walker investigation did them no favors. Nina Hendrik is a reporter whose obsession with the earlier case landed her a defamation suit and a tarnished reputation. Raul Martinez is the cop originally in charge of the investigation into Mandy’s disappearance, whose fragile sobriety has kept him in a professional holding pattern. Both are searching for redemption as they team up to find Meghan before she can come to the same fate as her older sister. But the kidnapper has other plans, as the Walkers are forced to reckon with truths they thought long buried.

The twists come hard and fast as Rich Douek turns the concept of family-focused reality TV on its head, getting to the simmering hatred at the core of so many of these shows. The dialog is as tight as the pacing, as the characters work, sometimes at cross-purposes, to save Meghan. Honestly, it delivered as much heart-pounding excitement and visceral impact as some of the 300-500 page thrillers I read regularly for CriminalElement.com.

The art is quietly brilliant, feeling like a throwback to when detective comics were more mainstream (tho perhaps my nostalgia is merely for the style echoed and enhanced by 90s Sandman Mystery Theatre) but with a firm embrace of modernity. The expressions are perfectly portrayed, with the colors and shading working to add depth and realism to an already impressive project. Honestly, this book makes me want to nominate it for things because I feel like it deserves so much recognition. It’s a fast-paced read that packs so much into 80+ pages. Highly recommended.

A Phone Call Away by Rich Douek & Russell Mark Olson was published August 6 2024 by Mad Cave Studios and is available from all good booksellers, including