The Lost Girl

In British author Carver’s predictable eighth thriller featuring Det. Insp. Phil Brennan (after Heartbreaker), the West Midlands policeman is called back to his old precinct in Colchester. Three men have been found hanged, each in a location associated with one of Brennan’s cases. Each man is dressed like Brennan, and in each of their jacket pockets is a tarot card with the detective’s name written on it. Phil never makes it to Colchester. At one point, he loses consciousness and wakes up in restraints in a strange replica of his own home, where he’s terrorized by an obviously unhinged woman who claims to know his darkest secret. Meanwhile, Det. Sgt. Imani Oliver begins the official search, and Brennan’s wife, criminal profiler Marina Esposito, sets off to conduct her own hunt. Their investigations lead them deep into the disturbed history and twisted psychosis of a woman named Fiona Welch. Carver’s prose is smooth, but the passages describing Fiona’s childhood in a children’s home are mostly salacious, the villain and her methods strain credulity, and genre veterans will likely guess most of Carver’s tricks. Agent: Jane Gregory, Gregory & Company (U.K.). (Nov.)