February 26, 2024
Forensic investigators Ellie Carr and Rachel Davies head to the Sunshine State for their third case (after What Harms You) in this lumpy thriller from bestseller Black. Reclusive tech guru Martin Post, the third-richest man in the U.S., summons Ellie and Rachel from Washington, D.C., to his Florida compound for a job. Two weeks earlier, Post’s pregnant daughter, Ashley, died in what appeared to be a boating accident. Post, however, suspects foul play, so he employs Ellie and Rachel to perform a second autopsy. The results indicate that intentional force may have killed Ashley, opening the gate for a flood of potential suspects: Could her husband, Greg, have done it? A rival tech company who’s competing with her father for a lucrative defense contract? A foreign government intent on stealing Post’s cutting-edge software for themselves? As suspicions proliferate, more bodies pile up, and Ellie and Rachel must find answers before they’re next on the chopping block. Black, a Floridian forensic scientist, infuses the narrative with scalpel-sharp regional and technical detail. Unfortunately, she’s shakier when it comes to the plot, delivering a herky-jerky investigation and rushed finale. This is best suited to devoted series fans. Agent: Vicky Bijur, Vicky Bijur Literary.
Starred review from January 15, 2024
A pair of forensic scientists helps a tech titan investigate his daughter's death. Although their history as colleagues at the Locard Institute has been relatively brief, Dr. Ellie Carr and Dr. Rachael Davies have formed a bond that's uncommonly close professionally while remaining more distant personally. That's about to change. Martin Post, the genius behind OakTree software design, summons them to the Gulf Coast to help determine whether his four-months-pregnant daughter, Ashley, died in an accidental drowning or was the victim of something more sinister. When they arrive at his Florida home, a palatial compound befitting the third-richest man in the United States, the investigators find a living situation that would try the most robust family ties. Ashley and her husband, Greg Anderson, lived entirely under Martin's domineering thumb. Solo excursions on her boat, Phantom, were Ashley's main source of release. Local police believe that, perhaps due to a pregnancy-related loss of balance, she was swept off the Phantom and drowned. But when Rachael's careful inspection of Ashley's body, recovered from the Gulf days after her disappearance, reveals a tiny nick in her spine, she and Ellie realize that they're looking at a murder. Meticulous Rachael and intuitive Ellie must answer a daunting number of questions about how Ashley came to be killed so many miles from land. The two investigators end up strengthening their personal connection as memories from Ellie's past, including details of her own mother's drowning, inflect their inquiry. Nothing about this case makes sense until it does. Cheers for Black's knotty puzzle and the two canny women who unravel it.
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