An engaging thriller for crime and mystery fans looking for an unconventional sleuth.
In this novel, a Texas nun becomes involved in the plights of two victims of Mexico’s kidnapping epidemic.
East Austin’s Sister Bridget Ann Rincón-Keller is shocked to discover a newborn infant on the grounds of her parish and then the blood-soaked Isabel Ortiz, the baby’s 15-year-old mother, who disappeared from her home in Mexico the year before. Isabel’s harrowing journey included being abducted by the monstrous serial kidnapper and drug trafficker El Gigante, being arrested by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, and escaping from the agency’s custody. The cards continue to be stacked against her when she is separated from her baby by a most determined foster parent. When Isabel steals her baby in a frantic, albeit ill-advised, bid to flee toward the border, Sister Bridget does what she can to protect her. But Isabel is safer than her friend JuanaSan Miguel, another El Gigante kidnap victim, who is still in his custody. Sister Bridget is determined to rescue Juana and heads down to Mexico, where she is joined by Austin police Det. Estevez of the Human Trafficking Unit. The two develop a bond that will test Sister Bridget’s vows. “Being with you or not being with you are two good choices,” she tells him. “I believe that either way is fine with God…as long as my faith and trust in God is not shaken.” This is Kolda’s second multicultural thriller to feature Sister Bridget, who is known as “a bit of a crime solver.” This outing is more character study than mystery (El Gigante is outed as the perpetrator early on), and it fleshes out Sister Bridget as a woman of unshakeable compassion and faith as well as resourcefulness and sharp-eyed cunning (she makes a keen observation about the foster mother’s home that the police miss). Sister Bridget disappears for a lengthy section when an older couple take Isabel under their wing, but they are engaging characters in their own rights, and the teen’s flight generates page-turning tension. There are only mild profanities, but some may find the descriptions of El Gigante’s crimes and scenes of violence disturbing.
An engaging thriller for crime and mystery fans looking for an unconventional sleuth.Pub Date: Sept. 21, 2022
ISBN: 978-1-5092-4217-7
Page Count: 302
Publisher: Wild Rose Press
Review Posted Online: Sept. 19, 2022
Review Program: Kirkus Indie
Although it lacks the surgical precision of Slaughter’s very best nightmares, this one richly earns its title.
More than a decade after a Georgia man is convicted of a monstrous double murder, an uncomfortably similar crime frees him and resets the search for the guilty party.
In Clifton County, home to the Rich Cliftons and the other Cliftons, the disappearance of teens Madison Dalrymple and Cheyenne Baker during the Halloween festivities hits everyone in North Falls hard. Working with her father, Sheriff Gerald Clifton, Deputy Emmy Lou Clifton hears the clock ticking down as she races frantically to get leads on the two friends, who’d been secretly plotting to take off for Atlanta after some undisclosed big score. As a longtime friend of Madison’s mother, Hannah, Emmy hopes against hope to find the missing teens before they’re both dead. By the time Emmy’s hopes are dashed, two unpleasantly likely suspects with strong attachments to underage sex partners have emerged, and one of them ends up in prison. In a bold move, Slaughter jumps over the next 12 years to the case of Paisley Walker, a 14-year-old whose disappearance catches the eye of retiring FBI criminal psychologist Jude Archer, who promptly crosses the country to come to Clifton County and take charge—um, that is, consult—on this heartrending new investigation. Emmy, suddenly and shockingly deprived of counsel from the parents who’ve supported her all her life, doesn’t get along any better with Jude than with the larger circle of Cliftons and the Clifton-Cliftons. But together they identify one new suspect, then another, before a shootout that arrives so early you just know there are still more surprises to come.
Although it lacks the surgical precision of Slaughter’s very best nightmares, this one richly earns its title.Pub Date: Aug. 12, 2025
ISBN: 9780063336773
Page Count: 448
Publisher: Morrow/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 16, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 15, 2025
Lapena’s talents shine in this irresistible novel about revenge, betrayal, and secrets.
So many suspects, so little evidence in Lapena’s latest tale of domestic suspense.
Busy mom Bryden Frost doesn’t see it coming after a morning fender bender involving a Tesla and its charming owner, Derek Gardner, sets her on a collision course with fate. Or does it? Just as in her other fast-moving, women-centric novels, including her breakout The Couple Next Door (2016), Lapena’s female protagonists appear to be living normal lives that some people might even envy—at least at first. When Bryden’s husband, Sam, returns home from work in Albany, New York, to find her missing but her purse and phone still in their apartment, a police investigation ensues. Did Bryden run away? Was she kidnapped? Or could she still be somewhere in the building? Sam is the prime suspect until police Det. Jayne Salter and her team hear from a source that Bryden was having an affair with Derek, something he denies. As Lapena builds her twisty plot, we soon see that these two men aren’t the only people who could be responsible for Bryden’s disappearance. Her sister, Lizzie, who has always been jealous of Bryden, has an addiction she’s hiding from the police, and Bryden’s best friend, Paige, carries a damaging secret as well. And what about the neighbor who was recently accused but not charged with kidnapping and raping a woman? Lapena excavates everyone’s secrets, exposing what’s really going on in the lives of Bryden’s family and friends. None of it is pretty. Lapena’s timely tale mixes the formidable dangers involved with online true-crime addiction with classic police work in a story that will make you wonder what secrets your family and friends are hiding and who, if anyone, you really know or can trust.
Lapena’s talents shine in this irresistible novel about revenge, betrayal, and secrets.Pub Date: July 29, 2025
ISBN: 9780593832448
Page Count: 352
Publisher: Pamela Dorman/Viking
Review Posted Online: May 3, 2025
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2025
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