The Murderer's Daughter
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- $11.99
Publisher Description
THE MURDERER'S DAUGHTER is a fast-paced psychological thriller filled with nail-biting suspense, deft plotting and featuring a stunning femme fatale in Grace Blades, former student of Alex Delaware. [A] taut thriller . . . with the richness and resonance of literary fiction' (Washington Independent Review of Books) from New York Times No. 1 bestselling Jonathan Kellerman, author of KILLER and BREAKDOWN. Jonathan's compelling, potent storytelling will appeal to all fans of Patricia Cornwell and Michael Connelly.
A brilliant and dedicated psychologist, Grace Blades has a gift for treating troubled souls and tormented psyches - because she bears her own invisible scars. Only five years old when she watched her parents die in a bloody murder-suicide, Grace took refuge in her fierce intellect and found comfort in the loving couple who adopted her. But her now-accomplished life has a secret side, ruled by an insatiable desire; by night she pursues the addictive thrills of sexual trysts with strangers. And when her two worlds unexpectedly converge, Grace's past returns with a vengeance, threatening to destroy everything she's fought for - including her life.
Shaken by the murder of her newest patient and fearful that an investigation will expose her double life, Grace sets out to probe the crime herself. But when she stumbles on the dead man's true identity, a horrifying chapter from her childhood is violently reawakened, forcing Grace to confront a decades-old act of evil crying out to be avenged. Suddenly stalked by dangerous men, Grace must turn to the talent for survival she's depended on all her life in order to face down the darkest personal demon she's ever battled: her own.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Many readers will struggle to sympathize with Grace Blades, the protagonist of this standalone with an improbable plot from bestseller Kellerman (Motive), after a flashback opening that shows five-year-old Grace living in a trailer park, neglected by her parents, and forced at a young age to forage. Grace overcame those horrific circumstances and is now, at 34, a highly regarded psychotherapist in L.A. Even though she's independently wealthy, Grace doesn't accept insurance or allow her patients to pay on a sliding scale. She has a reckless side, which she indulges in one-night flings with strangers. To her shock, one of those hookups becomes a new patient, Andrew Toner, who traveled from out of state to see her. Soon afterward, he's found murdered, and Grace turns sleuth after figuring out that he was using an alias. Readers should be prepared for some florid prose ("the ocean to the west a series of gray-cresting waves on black satin, the mountains to the east an endless chocolate bar").