The second of Johansen's suspensers starring Eve Duncan (The Face of Deception, 1998), a forensic sculptor who shapes human faces from the skulls of murder victims. The serial killer who murdered Eve's daughter Bonnie refused to tell her where he stashed the body. Eve has therefore devoted her life to bringing back her Bonnie and also the remains of other murdered children (the ``lost ones''), so that their families can have the closure of a proper burial. In this she is helped by tough Atlanta PD detective Joe Quinn, whose marriage, thanks to his obsession with Eve, was conveniently dissolved in The Face of Deception. Continuing in his role of investigator, protector, and grief therapist, he now hopes to add lover to that list and to get moody Eve to take a few emotional risks. For some flimsy reasons that may be recognizable to other serial killers, another deranged murderer has targeted Eve because his 20-year killing spree has left him burnt out and he hopes that murdering Eve will give him a fresh new direction. This mysterious monster, called ``Dom,'' tells her that he was really Bonnie's killer, and that he'll murder a ten-year-old girl, Jane, if Eve doesn't play his game. This gives Eve a chance to bond with Jane, a tough kid who like Eve was born in the slums of Atlanta, and to spend nearly all her time with Joe, a human guardian angel who seems never to sleep. Also watching over Eve is the ghost of Bonnie, who talks to her in dreams and is either a real angel or a figment of Eve's subconscious. Eve, Joe, and Jane, accompanied by the FBI, a journalist, and Sarah Patrick and her near-cadaver dog Monte, a golden retriever trained to locate bodies, pursue the increasingly bloodthirsty killer to Arizona, where they bring him down on the site of his tortured childhood. Johansen creates some nonconformist women characters along with heroes as devoted to them as golden retrievers.

Forensic sculptor Eve Duncan was raised in poverty, with an absentee dad and a cocaine-addicted mother. She overcame all odds, escaped her past, and became successful, only to have her eight-year-old daughter, Bonnie, abducted and murdered. Although Bonnie's body was never found, her accused killer was eventually put to death. Now Eve's friend, cop Joe Quinn, is involved in the discovery of a mass grave, and one of the skeletons is that of an eight-year-old child who could be Bonnie. But before the skeleton can be identified, Eve finds herself stalked by a terrifying killer who calls himself Dom, claims he murdered Bonnie, and gleefully threatens to kill Eve in the most gruesome way imaginable. Clearly, Dom is insane, but he knows enough about Eve to be able to push all her buttons. Dom's cat-and-mouse tactics terrify Eve, but they also make her furious--and determined to fight back. She vows to play Dom's fiendish game, offering herself as the "willing" victim to catch the killer. A cross between King's nightmarish chillers and Cornwell's forensic thrillers, Johansen's novel of psychological suspense features a hair-raising plot, a fiendish killer, a brave heroine, and dozens of heart-stopping plot twists. A certain winner. --Emily Melton

Johansen aims for the four million mark (her previous thrillers having collectively sold over three million copies) with this story of a forensic sculptor stalked by the serial killer responsible for her daughter's death. (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

Johansen is at the top of her game with this sinuous thriller. Emotionally damaged and self-contained forensic sculptor Eve Duncan (The Face of Deception) makes a return appearance, along with her old friend, the cynical, coolly smart cop Joe Quinn. At the start of the book, EveÄdevoted to forensic reconstruction since her eight-year-old daughter was murdered in Johansen's previous novel, her body never foundÄhas abandoned the day-to-day world for life on a Tahitian island. Eve's tropical exile is interrupted, however, when Joe shows up to tell her that a pile of bodies has been discovered in the Georgia woods, including that of a young girl he believes may be Eve's daughter. Determined to reconstruct the skull and hoping to lay her daughter to rest, Eve returns to the U.S. Her arrival draws the attention of Dom, the psychotic serial killer responsible for the Georgia murders. Random attacks on social outcasts don't produce the rush they once did for Dom, and now he needs to up the ante, by stalking and murdering more prominent people and interacting with his victims before he attacks. Eve, whose story he has long followed in newspaper accounts, becomes his next target. Delaying their confrontation until he feels it will have full impact, he interrupts her reconstruction work, plants doubts in her mind about the details of her daughter's death and threatens to kill a young foundlingÄa redheaded girl like her daughterÄwhom she befriends. An enthralling cat-and-mouse game ensues, throughout which Johansen maintains perfect pacing, always revealing just enough to keep the reader turning the pages. Aided by smart and realistic dialogue, the suspense holds until the very end. Major ad/promo; BDD audio. (Sept.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved