Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
The discovery of a homicide victim's scattered bones in the aftermath of a wildfire plunges Eve Ronin, the "youngest homicide detective in the history of the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department," into a politically tense, risky murder investigation in bestseller Goldberg's fast-paced sequel to 2020's Lost Hills. The remains are soon identified as those of a young woman who, six years earlier, went missing after she and a friend reported being gang-raped on a local beach. When evidence points to a secret clique of rogue cops in Eve's department, Eve faces resentment and obstruction from fellow deputies and higher-ups for violating the unspoken code of silence that protects fellow officers. An attempt on her life raises the stakes. Meanwhile, she has to fend off approaches from Hollywood agents who want to option her life story due to her celebrity from the Lost Hills case. Readers will cheer the determined Eve every step of the way as she strives for justice. Goldberg knows how to keep the pages turning. Agent: Amy Tannenbaum, Jane Rotrosen Agency. (Jan.)
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Review by Library Journal Review
Thanks to a YouTube video that went viral, Eve Ronin was promoted to the homicide division of the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department, working out of Lost Hills. Eve is the youngest detective there, and resented for it. She knows she's inexperienced, but she has an excellent mentor in her partner, Duncan Pavone, who has less than a year until retirement. Their current case takes them to the fire-blackened Santa Monica Mountains where bones are showing up after the most recent fire. Aided by a forensic anthropologist's findings, Eve and Duncan track the identities of multiple victims. One, Sabrina Morton, disappeared six years earlier after reporting she had been raped. Eve discovers a second rape victim who identifies a tattoo shared by the rapists. Half of the male detectives at the Lost Hills sheriff's station have that tattoo on their calves. The tension ratchets up in this fast-paced police procedural, which addresses sexism, cronyism, and corrupt officers, while also dealing with the investigative process. VERDICT Goldberg follows Lost Hills with a riveting, intense story. Readers of Karin Slaughter or Michael Connelly will want to try this.--Lesa Holstine, Evansville Vanderburgh P.L., IN
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Review by Kirkus Book Review
The bones found in the San Fernando Valley's Hueso Canyon send Robbery--Homicide Detective Eve Ronin up against the very last people she wants to tangle with. Stalked by Hollywood producers and writers who want to put her high-profile debut case onscreen or create a TV series around her and criticized as a camera-chasing diva by resentful colleagues, Eve would love to have the bone fragment horror screenwriter Sherwood Minter finds on the edge of his property be a routine discovery. But forensic anthropologist Dr. Daniel Brooks quickly unearths more bones and identifies them as those of Sabrina Morton, who vanished six years ago shortly after filing a rape complaint that was investigated by Detective, now Assistant Sheriff, Ted Nakamura. When the evidence indicates that Sabrina's rapists were most likely officers in the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department, Eve, who feels as if "I've already become a television character," faces some tough choices about how far she should push the case and whom she can trust. The mystery deepens when Dan, as Eve now calls him, finds part of an 11th finger in Hueso Canyon. Clearly Sabrina's body wasn't the only one left there. How are the victims connected, and what hope do Sabrina's embittered parents have of getting justice for their long-forgotten daughter? When her fellow cops regard her with suspicion and everyone else around her, from her neglectful mother to her long-absent father to the veteran agent trying to get her to take a meeting, wants a piece of Eve, it's hard to see how she can focus enough to solve the case--especially given the last-minute trick Goldberg has up his sleeve. Best in its disturbingly timely portrait of the police's "blue wall" fortified to repel even the most intrepid crusaders. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
