Full disclosure – I was provided an advanced reader’s copy of this book by the author or their representative but have voluntarily provided a review. All opinions are my own.
Discarded Lives
Madison Knight still struggles with the demons of her past. As a detective of the Stiles police department, she has seen her fair share of bad actors, but her recent involvement in taking down members of the mafia in her town has her looking over her shoulder. As a method of self-care, she often sneaks out for long midnight drives to sort her thoughts and clear her head. It is on one of these drives that an empty gas tank results in the discovery of a body discarded in a piece of luggage. As the first on the scene, Madison and her partner Detective Grant take the lead on the case, and it is not long before they begin to discover a pattern. All young females, all bearing a resemblance to each other, but with seemingly no other connections the going is slow until a common links between the victims emerges in a mutual connection on a dating site. As they explore and develop this lead the trail seemingly beging to grow cold. But when an unlikely trip to a homeless encampment provides the pair with an unexpected lead the pieces start to fall quickly into place. Can Madison and Terry apprehend the true killer before another life is lost?
Her Dark Grave is the 12th in the long running Detective Madison Knight series by author Carolyn Arnold. Picking up sometime after Girl on the Run, Madison is attempting to return to what passes as a normal life for a local police detective, but she is still unconvinced that her brush with the mafia in prior cases has not completely been resolved. While trying to keep these thoughts in check and most importantly out of the focus of her fiancé and fellow law enforcement officer, Knight has taken to creeping out in the dead of night for long, contemplative drives to clear her head. It is on one such drive that she runs out of gas and discovers the body of Tara Jackson stabbed numerous time and discarded in a suitcase. What better way to forget her current worries than to dive into a case and Knight and Detective Grant do just that with the skilled help of the author. From the opening line, Arnold grabs the reader and takes them on a case that is not as simple as it looks. The twists are quite unexpected and will keep the reader guessing until the very end. As I followed along, I couldn’t help but to try to play “sideline detective” myself while the case unfolded. Having read more than my share of both this series and Arnold’s sister series involving Detective Amanda Steele it never ceases to amaze me just how Arnold brings a fresh case with new situations and twists to the pages of her stories every time. With the police procedural genre becoming more popular the chance for these types of stories to become more formulaic and even cliché increases, however, Arnold has avoided this pitfall. Each of her books are unique, compelling and unforgettable with a cast of characters that remain throughout the entire series, the individual books also work well as a stand alone read for the newcomer to this author.
If you are a fan of serial killer novels, strong female leads and storylines that will immerse you and keep you guessing until the very end, I highly recommend Arnold’s work.
Jennly Reads 