Some Choose Darkness

This engrossing novel from Donlea (Don’t Believe It) pits forensic reconstructionist Rory Moore against a smart serial killer. In Chicago in the summer of 1979, five young women disappear, all of them victims of a man known as the Thief. They’re presumed murdered, but their bodies are never found. Angela Mitchell, who has “a gift and a curse to remember everything she ever saw,” is able to identify the Thief , but she goes missing before the police can question her. There’s enough evidence, however, to convict the Thief of Angela’s murder and send him to Illinois’s Stateville Correctional Center, where he’s a model prisoner. In 2019, the Thief is released on parole, and through circumstances beyond her control, Rory, a nonpracticing lawyer, becomes his attorney. Soon she’s immersed in trying to figure out exactly what happened to Angela. Donlea smoothly mixes red herrings and genuine clues. Notwithstanding some unanswered questions left hanging at the end, readers who relish a good puzzle will be rewarded. [em]Agent: Marlene Stringer, Stringer Literary. (June) [/em]