It starts out with a young boy shooting himself in the head. For some reason, I think his name is Sherman. He spends a really long time in a coma. Finally, he comes out of the coma, sets his house on fire and kills everyone in his house, except for his little sister. (Sounds like a happy book, right?).
So, the little girl is in the hospital. Some lady, I think it’s a nurse, kidnaps the girl. At some point, she also kidnaps a brother and sister who are being neglected by their mother (who’s in denial about their father being dead).
The kidnapper takes the kids to a house (on an island, I think). The brother shows up there for the showdown but I don’t remember how it ends.
The sad thing here is that I don’t even remember if this is a book or if I dreamt it at some point.
I also remember that the kidnapper gave each of the kids some coins, wrapped up in hankies.
one possibility:
Mondays Are Red
“Luke, 14, wakes up from a meningitis-induced coma to discover he has contracted an unusual condition known as synesthesia in which his senses blur into one another, causing him to associate words and objects through odd juxtapositions of taste, sight, smell, touch, and sound.”
“Through a confused and truly bizarre chain of events, Luke, left physically weak from the coma, semi-deranged from the synesthesia, and under the influence of Dreeg [an imaginary “presence”], eventually embarks on a final mission to rescue his sister from a kidnapper.”
Sounds like a good book but it’s definitely not the one I’m looking for. I’m positive the boy shoots himself in the head and kills everyone in his family except for his little sister. I think that at some point, he also has sex with the mother of the two other kidnapped children. He might even kill her but I"m not too sure about that one.