My thoughts
This is my seventh book by this author so to say I am a fan is a given. This book was great.
As you follow Steinbeck and Reed through a tough case that involves children in a small Minnesota town you will be holding your breath. Cringing as the pieces start falling into place. It makes you feel like you are in the dark and dreary woods. Along the wet streets. In the motel as they are trying to get some rest. These two stop at nothing to get at the truth. To solve a delicate and very hard case. Starting with a cold case they start with a home for serial killers. For old and what appears to be helpless serial killers.
When Harry and Van start looking into the things that are happening in Alku, MN they are in for a big discovery. More than just the cold case they are there to investigate. More than one man's brutal murder. They visit the nursing home where the serial killers are kept and get to know a few of the people running the place. Employees. The people in this small town are strange. They have a way of doing things that may not be exactly friendly for strangers. Or residents in some cases.
Seems Harry and Van care more about the children of this town than their own parents at times. Harry is dealing with a lot of guilt over his sister's abduction years ago. Van is still coming to terms with what she endured at the hands of a cult leader in a commune. Each has their problems but they are always there for each other too. When the children start disappearing things start to fall into place for these two detectives. They have info that will help wrap things up but is it as they thought. Could it be something else or someone else.... I did not figure this one out. I thought it was one person but I was WRONG... That doesn't happen a lot.
Thank you #NetGalley, #thomas&mercer for this ARC. This is my own true thoughts about this book.
Five big stars.
As you follow Steinbeck and Reed through a tough case that involves children in a small Minnesota town you will be holding your breath. Cringing as the pieces start falling into place. It makes you feel like you are in the dark and dreary woods. Along the wet streets. In the motel as they are trying to get some rest. These two stop at nothing to get at the truth. To solve a delicate and very hard case. Starting with a cold case they start with a home for serial killers. For old and what appears to be helpless serial killers.
When Harry and Van start looking into the things that are happening in Alku, MN they are in for a big discovery. More than just the cold case they are there to investigate. More than one man's brutal murder. They visit the nursing home where the serial killers are kept and get to know a few of the people running the place. Employees. The people in this small town are strange. They have a way of doing things that may not be exactly friendly for strangers. Or residents in some cases.
Seems Harry and Van care more about the children of this town than their own parents at times. Harry is dealing with a lot of guilt over his sister's abduction years ago. Van is still coming to terms with what she endured at the hands of a cult leader in a commune. Each has their problems but they are always there for each other too. When the children start disappearing things start to fall into place for these two detectives. They have info that will help wrap things up but is it as they thought. Could it be something else or someone else.... I did not figure this one out. I thought it was one person but I was WRONG... That doesn't happen a lot.
Thank you #NetGalley, #thomas&mercer for this ARC. This is my own true thoughts about this book.
Five big stars.
About
By-the-book forensic scientist Harry Steinbeck and rogue BCA agent Van Reed must catch a cold-case killer who’s returned to abduct a small town’s children one by one in this heart-stopping novel from the Edgar Award–nominated author of Unspeakable Things.
In 1998 an Alku, Minnesota, family of five was brutally murdered in their sleep. The event shook the insulated community but, without any solid leads, was relegated to the cold case files, where it moldered for twenty-five years. Until today.
Agent Harry Steinbeck hoped never to return to the northland, a place that holds terrible memories of his sister’s abduction. But when a recent homicide is connected to Alku’s unsolved mass murder, he and cold case agent Evangeline Reed have no choice but to investigate.
The case grows impossibly darker as, one by one, the children of Alku begin disappearing. And Harry and Van can’t shake the sensation that someone is watching every move they make.
As an elusive killer’s trail leads to a truth more sinister than either imagined, Harry knows there’s only one way to crack this he must finally face the secrets of his own past—even if doing so will cost him everything.
In 1998 an Alku, Minnesota, family of five was brutally murdered in their sleep. The event shook the insulated community but, without any solid leads, was relegated to the cold case files, where it moldered for twenty-five years. Until today.
Agent Harry Steinbeck hoped never to return to the northland, a place that holds terrible memories of his sister’s abduction. But when a recent homicide is connected to Alku’s unsolved mass murder, he and cold case agent Evangeline Reed have no choice but to investigate.
The case grows impossibly darker as, one by one, the children of Alku begin disappearing. And Harry and Van can’t shake the sensation that someone is watching every move they make.
As an elusive killer’s trail leads to a truth more sinister than either imagined, Harry knows there’s only one way to crack this he must finally face the secrets of his own past—even if doing so will cost him everything.
