‘Don’t Hang Up’ is an Audible Originals drama that grabbed my attention and then kept pushing. The plot hook sounds simple: someone calls the graveyard shift playlist-with-talk-slots-for-insomniacs, reluctantly run by a used-to-be-rising-star of radio and threatens to kill a woman who is being held hostage if the radio host hangs up on him.

Of course, I immediately wanted to know WHY the caller was doing this and why they’d called this particular nobody-is-listening-to-it-anyway radio show.

I took the full three hours to find out the answer to that question and when it came it caught me by surprise and it made me grin.

The story is told from the point of view of the radio host. In other thrillers, this guy would be the hero, bravely battling to save the hostage’s life, a radio DJ version of John Mclane in ‘Die Hard’. Benjamin Stevenson chose a more interesting route, Adam Turner, his main character, is an arsehole: a narcissist with a chip on his shoulder, an habitual liar who feels entitled to break any rule he finds inconvenient and who blames any failures on other people and sees any negative consequences as a sign of how unfair the universe is to men like him. He’s a hard man to like, although probably an easy man to get elected.

And yet, in his own way, he does do his best to save the hostage.

Except, his hands are far from clean and it soon becomes clear that the caller has an agenda that includes getting Adam Turner to destroy his life live on-air.

I listened to this in one sitting on a long, boring drive along the motorway. It kept me entertained, occasionally made me laugh, kept me constantly curious and never quite stepped over the No-I-don’t-buy-that plausibility line.

If you’re looking for three hours of tense entertainment, I recommend ‘Don’t Hang Up’ to you.

Luke Arnold did a superb job as the main narrator. He kept the energy levels high and made the tension palpable. Click on the SoundCloud link below to hear a sample.