Frank H. (perryfran) reviewed on 8/18/2022 + 1223 more book reviews

Helpful Score: 1

This is the first book by Karin Slaughter that I have read after hearing good things about her thrillers. Although I found this book to be very disturbing, it was also very compelling and kept me turning the pages. It tells the story from the perspective of two sisters, Claire and Lydia, who have been estranged from each other for years. Their older sister, Julia, disappeared without a trace 20 years earlier when she was nineteen and attending college. This event has haunted both sisters since then. Interspersed within the novel are excerpts from their father's journal that he writes to Julia as he tries to find out what happened to her. And then there is the disappearance of another young teenaged girl. Could this be connected to Julia's disappearance? So what happened to Julia? As the novel progresses, Claire and Lydia are thrown back together as they discover a very vile history of rape, torture, and murder that leads to a person close to them.

This novel contained some really disturbing descriptions of the terrible things that can be inflicted on pretty young women by sadistic psychopathic men. This was probably the most horrific novel in this regard I have read since AMERICAN PSYCHO. There were some twists to the story that I wasn't expecting and the narrative kept me reading to a rather satisfactory conclusion. The novel was long at over 500 pages which probably could have been shortened somewhat but overall it was a very compelling thriller. I have heard good things about Slaughter's other novels including her Grant County and Will Trent series. At some point, I'll be reading more of her.

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