Saturday, December 27, 2014

Vanished-Elizabeth Heiter

Vanished
Elizabeth Heiter
Mira, Dec 30 2014, $7.99
ISBN 9780778317388

Almost two decades have passed since someone kidnapped Evelyn Baine’s twelve years old BFF Cassie Byers.  The case to include two other similar abductions from apparently the same culprit dubbed the Nursery Rhyme Killer remains unsolved; but also motivated Evelyn into becoming a profiler (see Hunted).

In the present at the Aquia, Virginia FBI Behavior Analysis Unit where Evelyn works, Cassie’s mom Julie calls her not with the news they found her daughter’s corpse, but that the Nursery Rhyme Killer has returned to Rose Bay, South Carolina snatching Brittany Douglas.  Evelyn pleads with her boss to let her join the Child Abduction Rapid Deployment team already at the scene as she insists she would be the best profiler for this case.  While he fears a conflict of interest he sends her knowing Evelyn will go home anyway.  Local police officer Jack Bullock objects to Evelyn’s presence as her name is on the rhyme left behind during the Cassie kidnapping, but Chief Tomas accepts her as a motivated asset.  As she begins her profile, Evelyn knows this may be her last case if solved her life mission is over and if not she is dead.

The second Profiler police procedural is a tense psychological mystery in which the heroine’s connection to one of the cold case kidnappings adds a personal spin that thaws her previous tundra personality.  The hunt for the missing child running out of time makes for a compelling read; even as nothing new is added to the profiling of the Criminal Minds serial killer theme.


Harriet Klausner

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