Author: Joanna Schaffhausen
Published: January 15th 2019 by Minotaur Books
Format: Hardcover, 320 pages
Genre: Police Procedural
Series: Ellery Hathaway #2
I continue to say that Joanna Schaffhausen is an underappreciated author. Her books ask questions along the way, leave parts open to interpretation, only to have them all neatly answered by the end without insulting the reader or using gimmicks.
Ellery Hathaway was kidnapped as a child, as an adult, she thought that was behind her, but like the last book, "The Vanishing Season" showed us, sometimes the past comes back. Now with her career as a Boston police officer hanging in the balance, she is in court-appointed counseling where she meets weekly with other crime victims. Once a cop always a cop so when their stories take on new meaning, Ellery calls on Reed Markham, the FBI agent that saved her.
Wendy Mendoza lives in fear that her unknown attacker will come back. She cannot forget, she wears a tattoo of the last words that he said to her. Myra, wheelchair-bound, wears the burn scars that she sustained when her furniture business when up in flames and she desperately tried to get to her child. There are other stories from the group, but this is where Ellery, with the help of Markham, starts her investigation.
The deeper they dig, the less the stories make sense. Where Wendy gives them little to go on, there are holes in Myra's case. Wholes that can bring down senior officers and prevent Markham from the promotion that will let him stay closer to his daughter.
By the conclusion, Joanna Schaffhausen tells you exactly where the next book is going. You can see it forming her in mind and you are right there with her as she delves deeper into Reed Markham's past and the adoptive family that calls him one of their own.
Ellery Hathaway was kidnapped as a child, as an adult, she thought that was behind her, but like the last book, "The Vanishing Season" showed us, sometimes the past comes back. Now with her career as a Boston police officer hanging in the balance, she is in court-appointed counseling where she meets weekly with other crime victims. Once a cop always a cop so when their stories take on new meaning, Ellery calls on Reed Markham, the FBI agent that saved her.
Wendy Mendoza lives in fear that her unknown attacker will come back. She cannot forget, she wears a tattoo of the last words that he said to her. Myra, wheelchair-bound, wears the burn scars that she sustained when her furniture business when up in flames and she desperately tried to get to her child. There are other stories from the group, but this is where Ellery, with the help of Markham, starts her investigation.
The deeper they dig, the less the stories make sense. Where Wendy gives them little to go on, there are holes in Myra's case. Wholes that can bring down senior officers and prevent Markham from the promotion that will let him stay closer to his daughter.
By the conclusion, Joanna Schaffhausen tells you exactly where the next book is going. You can see it forming her in mind and you are right there with her as she delves deeper into Reed Markham's past and the adoptive family that calls him one of their own.
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