Labuskes' series starter lays solid groundwork for future episodes featuring agents Susanto and Kilkenny, both complex characters with intriguing backstories, motivations, and personal blind spots. Hand to fans of Iris Johansen's forensic sculptor Eve Duncan and other detectives who take an unconventional approach to solving crime.” —Booklist
“Women pathologists (Patricia Cornwell) and forensic anthropologists (Elly Griffiths) have starred in recent mysteries that appeared on best-of-the-year lists. Through her terrific new heroine, Labuskes has the fire and smarts to join them on the award dais.” —Library Journal (starred review)
Praise for Brianna Labuskes
What Can’t Be Seen
“The book’s well-constructed plot matches its three-dimensional characters. Psychological-thriller fans will be eager for more.” —Publishers Weekly
A Familiar Sight
“A horrific brew for readers willing to immerse themselves in it.” —Kirkus Reviews
“A strong plot and unforgettable characters make this a winner. Labuskes is on a roll.” —Publishers Weekly
“A Familiar Sight has everything I crave in a thriller: a shocking, addictive female lead; unexpected twists that snapped off the page; and an ending that made me gasp out loud. I never saw it coming, but it was perfectly in sync with the razor-sharp balance between creepy and compelling that Labuskes carries throughout the novel. This is a one-sitting read.” —Jess Lourey, Amazon Charts bestselling author
Her Final Words
“Labuskes skillfully ratchets up the suspense. Readers will eagerly await her next.” —Publishers Weekly
“Labuskes offers an intense mystery with an excellent character in Lucy, who methodically uncovers layers of deceit while trusting no one.” —Library Journal
Girls of Glass
“Excellent…Readers who enjoy having their expectations upset will be richly rewarded.” —Publishers Weekly (starred review)
It Ends with Her
“Once in a while a character comes along who gets under your skin and refuses to let go. This is the case with Brianna Labuskes’s Clarke Sinclair—a cantankerous, rebellious, and somehow endearingly likable FBI agent with a troubled past. I was immediately pulled into Clarke’s broken, shadow-filled world and her quest for justice and redemption. A stunning thriller, It Ends with Her is not to be missed.” —Heather Gudenkauf, New York Times bestselling author
“It Ends with Her is a gritty, riveting roller-coaster ride of a book. Brianna Labuskes has created a layered, gripping story around a cast of characters that readers will cheer for. Her crisp prose and quick plot kept me reading with my heart in my throat. Highly recommended for fans of smart thrillers with captivating heroines.” —Nicole Baart, author of Little Broken Things
“An engrossing psychological thriller filled with twists and turns. I couldn’t put it down! The characters were filled with emotional depth. An impressive debut!” —Elizabeth Blackwell, author of In the Shadow of Lakecrest
2023-10-20
Twenty-five years after a double murder stunned the little town of Everly, Washington, a copycat seems to be following in the original killer’s path.
If you ask veteran Everly sheriff Samantha Mason, there’s never been any doubt who killed Timothy and Rebecca Parker, a pair of brilliant mathematicians who taught at the local college, and plunged their three young daughters into foster care. It was their teenage son, Alex, who’d already displayed troubling enough behavior to put his school counselor on alert even before he wrote a story about a cannibal serial killer a few days before his parents’ deaths. But Alex died, too, obligingly leaving behind a confessional suicide note to head off any doubts about his guilt. Now Delaney Moore, a content moderator for a social media site, has pulled a video showing the corpses of Bob and Gina Balducci, one of whom had an uncomfortable relationship with the Parkers, staged in a remarkably similar scene. The discovery brings FBI agent Callum Kilkenny to Everly, along with FBI forensic linguist Raisa Susanto, who’s trying to live down a fatal mistake she made in identifying the author of an anonymous missive from the idiolectic patterns in which she specializes. As Raisa beats the bushes for evidence she can use to redeem herself, she (naturally) doesn’t realize that Labuskes is alternating the chapters that track the stages of her investigation with chapters from the viewpoint of Delaney, whose consistent determination to take violent revenge on anyone who’s ever wronged her leaves Raisa’s own troubled childhood in the dust. So Raisa never has a chance to read that “Delaney wasn’t made for love. She was made for death.”
As untidy and unflinching as a tornado whose eye is more frightful still.
