A steady diet of mixed genre reading can’t well avoid a female authored female driven thriller for long since they are everywhere. This time it was more of a police procedural, though, so…refreshing. Kinda. Alger’s protagonist is an FBI agent Nell Flynn. Technically on leave from work, but never really off the job as it were. She comes back to Long Island to bury her father a local police detective, and finds herself assisting in solving a local murder, potentially work of a serial killer. Suddenly, dangers are lurking everywhere, she isn’t sure who to trust, because what’s going on on the island may be much more complex and involve people close to her. So that’s the basic plot. The narration moves along very swiftly, present tense and heavily dialogue driven for that specific sort of thrilleresque immediacy. Nell is tough as nails and driven like a freight train, an almost too perfect sort of detective, nothing gets in her way. And to her credit she does solve the entire thing in under 300 pages, uncovering layers of cover up that involves a variety of social classes on the strategically class divided island. Turns out Long Island is a multilayered severely socially striated sort of place where everyone takes advantage of everyone and does whatever they can get away with. Until Nell Flynn gets there to sort it all out that is. I’m not a huge fan of procedurals, but after reading entirely too many of the other kind of suspense thrillers (where mysteries are solved by the unwitting nonprofessionals) it was a nice change. Nothing especially mind blowing, more on the side of averagely decent, a few nice twists, one of which I figured out right away, but one was a pleasant surprise. Very tough and gruff sort of story and characters, mostly, like a proper cop show. Sounds like it might be a start of a series, Nell certainly has what it takes to carry more the weight, but then again the world doesn’t need any more series and this book, although not quite a perfect entertainment, was perfectly entertaining in its own right as a standalone. Fun very quick read. Not in any way overpowered by estrogen as these things tend to go. Genre fans should enjoy this one. Thanks Netgalley.

Thanks to Christina Alger, Penguin Group/Putnam, and Netgalley for providing me with a digital advance copy of this novel. I loved this book - a layered, beautifully written, complicated mystery that kept me guessing and hooked until the last page. I particularly enjoyed all of the strong, smart female characters. I was sorry for it to end! Highly recommend this novel! I look forward to reading more from this author in the future.

A chilling page turner.I was immediately caught up in the story this is an author I will be following.I will be recommending this well written page turner to all y friends, #netgalley #outnambooks

An excellent thriller! Kudos to the writer for bringing the characters to life, and for making the plot so fascinating. I enjoyed the book very much and woul love to read more by this talented author.

This is a riveting mystery, which totally engaged me from start to finish. Set in Suffolk County, Long Island, it deals with so many timely issues told within the framework of a fascinating thriller.

Nell Flynn, on leave from her job in the Behavioral Analysis Unit of the FBI, returns to her unhappy home to bury her policeman father, killed in a motorcycle crash. She is greeted by his police buddies and soon a corpse found nearby. Despite being on leave, she quickly becomes involved in a murder investigation.

The body hits close to home for Nell since it brings back memories of both her father and her dead mother. It reminded me of the various stories surrounding Jeffrey Epstein, and the rumors of child sex trafficking that have been connected to him and his powerful political buddies. Being very familiar with the setting of the book, I recognized issues which have become linked with the area of poverty and immigrants who service the wealthy, privileged denizens of the Hamptons.

I would certainly recommend this to seminars and book clubs, lots to talk about. So much is newsworthy and troubling. Thank you Netgalley for allowing me to be an early reader.

I really couldn’t put the book down as I followed Nell searching for answers, about the bodies, the police and her own parents.