Among the wicked

Usually, when a fictional cop or sleuth infiltrates a cult, the bad guys are wearing camo and toting automatic weapons. In Castillo's latest Kate Burkholder mystery, however, the cultists are clothed in Amish garb, and the weapons are well hidden in the hay loft. But the menace is no less present, as Burkholder, chief of police in Painters Mill, Ohio, soon discovers when she goes underground in upstate New York to investigate a series of disappearances in an Amish community. It quickly becomes apparent that this is no ordinary community; the surface tranquility hides far more than the typical roiling resentments that Burkholder, who grew up Amish, has encountered in previous installments of the series. A rogue minister has taken over the community's leadership and used the Amish's notorious secrecy to mask a criminal enterprise that he is willing to kill to protect. This is a first-rate and very unusual thriller; Castillo builds suspense brilliantly, using both the snowbound setting and the difficulty of working as an undercover Amish woman to great advantage (it's no easy trick drawing your gun when it's stashed beneath layers of full-length dresses and aprons).--Ott, Bill Copyright 2016 Booklist

In bestseller Castillo's exciting eighth Kate Burkholder mystery (after 2015's After the Storm), Sheriff Dan Suggs from Franklin City, N.Y., and Frank Betancourt, a senior investigator with the BCI division of the New York State Police, ask Kate, the Painters Mill, Ohio, police chief, who escaped her Amish upbringing at 18, to go undercover to get to the bottom of the death of a 15-year-old Amish girl, Rachel Esh. Rachel was found frozen in the woods with evidence of Oxycontin in her bloodstream; she appeared to have undergone a recent abortion. The New York lawmen also ask Kate to determine whether the rumors of "bad goings-on" in the upstate Amish community headed by Bishop Eli Schrock, who's reputedly intent on separating his congregation from contact with the outside world, are true. Kate finds it difficult to refuse and overrides her lover's fears about the assignment. The feisty Kate is soon immersed in the Amish world and engaged in a ferocious battle for her life. Readers will be enthralled as Kate uncovers secrets in a quaint Amish community. 150,000 announced first printing; author tour. Agent: Nancy Yost, Nancy Yost Literary Agency. (July) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.