The Good Daughter

In the prologue of this gripping standalone from Thriller Award–finalist Slaughter (Pretty Girls), Zach Culpepper and an accomplice break into the Pikeville, Ga., home of attorney Rusty Quinn, who has become an unpopular figure for his advocacy on behalf of “outlaw bikers, drug gangs, and child killers,” as well as abortion clinics and unions. Ironically, Zach is someone Rusty has defended in the past. The thugs gun down Rusty’s wife and brutalize his teen daughters, Charlotte and Samantha. Samantha is shot in the head and buried alive, her fate left uncertain. Flash forward 28 years: Charlotte, now a lawyer, gets caught in a school shooting that claims the lives of the principal and a student. Charlotte spots a teenager wearing goth makeup holding a gun, but she believes something about the crimes doesn’t add up and investigates herself. Meanwhile, the shooting incident revives memories of the trauma that she and her family suffered years before. Slaughter keeps the twists coming, but some plot developments come at the expense of psychological depth. [em]Author tour. Agent: Victoria Sanders, Victoria Sanders & Associates. (Aug.) [/em]