After his sister and brother in law were brutally slain in their home, Frank Rath gave up his badge to raise his months’ old niece as his daughter. But with his skills and instincts he never truly strayed that far from the job, taking up the profession of private detective, often having his daughter Rachel help him see the pieces of the puzzle he was missing. When his friend from the force comes to him asking him to investigate what has happened to his gorgeous niece Mandy, whose car was left abandoned on the side of the road and no evidence of a struggle Rath ends up connecting Mandy’s disappearance with the disappearance of numerous young women across two state lines. As if this isn’t enough, his daughter is away at college which both makes Frank proud but also scared that he can’t look out for her anymore. Also, the man who murdered his sister is up for parole. All of these plot points come together in an ultimately satisfying mystery/thriller about what happens when people are fervent in their beliefs. So fervent that they would kill over them. CW: abortion, anti-choice evangelicals.
I enjoyed the book, it was fast paced and had several well placed red herrings that had me questioning who were the victims and who were the perpetrators. At first I thought that maybe I was reading a second or third book in the series because while I got some back story, there wasn’t a ton of character development of the main characters. However, looking at the list of books this was in fact the first of a series. I will say as my only criticism, there are so many things happening at the end of the book that it was almost dizzying. The end end though? Filled me with so much dread that I’m probably going to purchase the next book in the series so I can pick right back up from where I left off. If you like mystery/thrillers this is on sale right now.
