Low-intensity.
Jones draws on her nonfiction background (Birthmothers, 1993, etc.) to craft a thriller debut.
Someone is kidnapping or murdering the nannies of South Philadelphia—four in three weeks! One winter day divorced single mother Zoe Hayes sits outdoors with her adopted six-year-old daughter, Molly, who finds a severed finger with chipped red nail polish on the snowy curb. After being interviewed by Detective Nick Stiles, Zoe wails her woes to best friend Susan Cummings, an overloaded defense lawyer but pulled-together homemaker. Susan warns that her neighborhood is full of depravity, a thought echoed by Zoe’s bonkers elderly neighbor, Old Charlie. Now Claudia Rusk, the nanny for Susan’s next-door neighbor, is missing. Meanwhile, anxiety-ridden Zoe holds art therapy classes at The Institute, where she leads the deranged toward sanity through art. Jones throws suspects at us, including Coach Gene of Molly’s gymnastics class, Zoe’s ex-husband Michael, Susan’s always far-off husband Tim, leering construction workers and phobic neighbor Victor, who never leaves his house and rarely is spotted even at his windows. Zoe finds herself having an overnight with Detective Stiles, who gets along fine with Molly in the morning by making a pancake breakfast. But when Stiles won’t admit to more body parts being found, Zoe tries to dump him. A profile of the killer by fab personality and forensic psychiatrist Beverly Gardner points to the perp getting fearless, perhaps insinuating himself into the investigation, even leaving the finger Molly found pointing to Zoe’s house, as if to say her nanny, Angela, will be the next victim. The courtship and cooking scenes featuring Nick and Zoe have some zip, buddy Susan’s lawyerly acid and daughter Molly’s lively dialogue are pluses, but the tale moves into familiar and strained territory with a cross-dressing villain.
Low-intensity.Pub Date: May 1, 2005
ISBN: 0-312-33038-3
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Dunne/St. Martin's
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: March 15, 2005
Slaughter (Cop Town, 2014, etc.) is so uncompromising in following her blood trails to the darkest places imaginable that...
Twenty-four years after a traumatic disappearance tore a Georgia family apart, Slaughter’s scorching stand-alone picks them up and shreds them all over again.
The Carrolls have never been the same since 19-year-old Julia vanished. After years of fruitlessly pestering the police, her veterinarian father, Sam, killed himself; her librarian mother, Helen, still keeps the girl's bedroom untouched, just in case. Julia’s sisters have been equally scarred. Lydia Delgado has sold herself for drugs countless times, though she’s been clean for years now; Claire Scott has just been paroled after knee-capping her tennis partner for a thoughtless remark. The evening that Claire’s ankle bracelet comes off, her architect husband, Paul, is callously murdered before her eyes and, without a moment's letup, she stumbles on a mountainous cache of snuff porn. Paul’s business partner, Adam Quinn, demands information from Claire and threatens her with dire consequences if she doesn’t deliver. The Dunwoody police prove as ineffectual as ever. FBI agent Fred Nolan is more suavely menacing than helpful. So Lydia and Claire, who’ve grown so far apart that they’re virtual strangers, are unwillingly thrown back on each other for help. Once she’s plunged you into this maelstrom, Slaughter shreds your own nerves along with those of the sisters, not simply by a parade of gruesome revelations—though she supplies them in abundance—but by peeling back layer after layer from beloved family members Claire and Lydia thought they knew. The results are harrowing.
Slaughter (Cop Town, 2014, etc.) is so uncompromising in following her blood trails to the darkest places imaginable that she makes most of her high-wire competition look pallid, formulaic, or just plain fake.Pub Date: Sept. 29, 2015
ISBN: 978-0-06-242905-6
Page Count: 400
Publisher: Morrow/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: June 30, 2015
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2015
Chavez delivers a fraught if flawed page-turner that attempts too many twists.
A good Samaritan incurs a psychopath’s wrath in this debut thriller.
Veterinarian Cassie Larkin is heading home after a 12-hour shift when someone darts in front of her car, causing her to dump her energy drink. As she pulls over to mop up the mess, her headlights illuminate a couple having a physical altercation. Cassie calls 911, but before help arrives, the man tosses the woman down an embankment. Ignoring the dispatcher’s instructions, Cassie exits the vehicle and intervenes, preventing the now-unconscious woman’s murder. With sirens wailing in the distance, the man warns Cassie: “Let her die, and I’ll let you live.” He then scrambles back to the road and flees in Cassie’s van. Using mug shots, Cassie identifies the thief and would-be killer as Carver Sweet, who is wanted for poisoning his wife. The Santa Rosa police assure Cassie of her safety, but the next evening, her husband, Sam, vanishes while trick-or-treating with their 6-year-old daughter, Audrey. Hours later, he sends texts apologizing and confessing to an affair, but although it’s true that Sam and Cassie have been fighting, she suspects foul play—particularly given the previous night’s events. Cassie files a report with the cops, but they dismiss her concerns, leaving Cassie to investigate on her own. After a convoluted start, Chavez embarks on a paranoia-fueled thrill ride, escalating the stakes while exploiting readers’ darkest domestic fears. The far-fetched plot lacks cohesion and relies too heavily on coincidence to be fully satisfying, but the reader will be invested in learning the Larkin family’s fate through to the too-pat conclusion.
Chavez delivers a fraught if flawed page-turner that attempts too many twists.Pub Date: Feb. 18, 2020
ISBN: 978-0-06-293617-2
Page Count: 320
Publisher: Morrow/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: Nov. 24, 2019
Kirkus Reviews Issue: Dec. 15, 2019
BOOK REVIEW
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