Review by Booklist Review
Homicide detective Elouise Lou Norton (Skies of Ash, 2015) is back in another smart L.A. procedural. A serial killer is murdering girls from poor neighborhoods who are, in spite of the odds, excelling in school and special interests. The killer begins leaving notes for Lou, identifying the girls as his muses. The girls all share a background not unlike Lou's young women of color from broken homes, who endured tough childhoods but possessed the will and talent to do better for themselves. As Lou and her colleagues interview all the adults who intersected in these girls' lives, they encounter gang members, an overly attentive teacher, and a recently paroled pedophile. Lou has a strong support system on the squad and from a group of girlfriends with whom she grew up. She also has a budding relationship with the assistant district attorney. This determined African American protagonist makes a wonderful addition to the genre.--Keefe, Karen Copyright 2016 Booklist
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
When the body of 13-year-old Chanita Lords turns up in a duffel bag in a park early in Hall's suspenseful third mystery featuring LAPD homicide detective Elouise "Lou" Norton (after 2015's Skies of Ash), Lou and her partner, Colin Taggart, initially focus on a sex offender who's a neighbor of the victim in the housing projects, but it's soon obvious things are not quite what they seem. In the sprawling Los Angeles cityscape, racial tensions still run deep, and the dogged Lou, who grew up in the same projects as Chanita, is careful never to forget where she was raised and how far she's come. She's also witty, and the banter between her and Colin brings some welcome levity to the dark deeds they're investigating. Meanwhile, recently divorced Lou is getting used to being single, and her father, who left her when she was a kid, reenters her life. Readers weary of the dour, pessimistic detectives so common to genre can relate to Lou. Those hungry for chills will be satisfied as the action builds to a surprising, terrifying climax. Agent: Jill Marsal, Marsal Lyon Literary Agency. (May) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Review by Library Journal Review
L.A. homicide detective Elouise "Lou" Norton and her partner Colin Taggert investigate murders in the area of the city that encompasses the Jungle, the rough neighborhood where she grew up. In this third book in the series (after Land of Shadows and Skies of Ash), Lou and Colin respond to a report of a body found in a large canvas bag on a trail in Bonner Park. The case hits close to home when Lou discovers the victim lived in her childhood apartment building. The detectives follow all leads when another young girl goes missing and is found dead in the same park. Meanwhile, the killer is also stalking Lou and leaving her cryptic clues to decipher. Hall's complex plot keeps readers guessing to the very end of this taut mystery. Hall has created a strong and likable African American detective who rivals Michael Connelly's Harry Bosch in grit, intelligence, and tenacity. Verdict Anyone who enjoys police procedurals with well-developed, tightly woven plots will delight in Hall's mysteries. [Previewed in Erica Ruth Neubauer's "Edge-of-Your-Seat Thrills," LJ 4/15/16.]-Sandra Knowles, South Carolina State Lib., Columbia © Copyright 2016. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Kirkus Book Review
Talented African-American teenagers from a poor LA neighborhood are targeted by a serial killer. Elouise "Lou" Norton was once one of those aspiring teens, and now she's a homicide detective who still hasn't won the promotion she deserves. Beneath her tough exterior lurk some inner demons; she's just divorced her wealthy, unfaithful husband, and the long-ago murder of her sister was only recently solved. Now Victor Starr, the father who deserted the family when she was a child, wants to make amends. Lou's living with a newspaper-reporter friend and starting a tentative romance with DA Sam Seward when she catches the case of a dead African-American teenage girl found in a duffel bag in beautiful Martha Bonner Park. Lou and her white, Colorado-born partner, Colin Taggert, finally bond over the complex case as they find more victims apparently all killed by the same clever killer. Lou's even more disturbed when they discover that the first victim lived in the same crumbling apartment complex where she herself grew up. Lou's investigation reveals that several other missing black girls went to the same school as her victim, had the same guidance counselor, and were despised and sometimes attacked by their fellow students for being brighter and more talented than the rest. Although the missing girls are all eventually found in duffel bags in the park, they were killed elsewhere, moved several times, and injected with bug repellent. In a neighborhood where tensions between African-Americans and Mexicans are ratcheting up, a Mexican with a long record of child abuse is an obvious suspect, but there are plenty of others. Lou scrambles to find a killer who enjoys using coded messages and leaving statues of Greek muses on her car. Striving to solve her own personal problems while in the midst of her most difficult case will only make her strongerif she survives. The third and best of a finely wrought series (Skies of Ash, 2015, etc.) that gives voice to a rare figure in crime fiction: a highly complex, fully imagined black female detective. Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
