Find Me

Carol O'Connell

2/2/2007

Route 66 - that cross country road still has nostalgia for many Americans although it is no longer the main thoroughfare it was. Parts of it aren't there now, others have shifted. Yet it lives in American current folklore. Mallory is following Route 66 from Chicago to California, using old letters in her possession to follow the route taken by another person many years earlier. She is not only following the letters' instructions, but is also following on the heels of a serial killer.

But being Mallory, she left New York City without a word to anyone, including her partner or requesting time off from the New York Police Department. As Find Me opens, her partner Sgt. Riker and the medical examiner are in her abandoned apartment. There is a dead woman there instead, apparently a suicide victim. At least the two men hope it was suicide and that Mallory didn't kill her before she took off. Riker calls in favors, discovers where she is, borrows a car, and follows her.

A group of parents guided by their on-line psychiatrist and therapist are on a quest. They are driving Route 66 giving away flyers of their missing children. All the missing children appear to be young girls between the ages of 5 and 8. Small graves are being discovered along Route 66. But one of the fathers is killed in Chicago. His body is left at the intersection where Route 66 officially began and his body points down the fabled road.

Mallory is following her letters and these people. After she inspects the site of the first death, she meets up with them. After a few hundred miles and another attempted murder she realizes that the group and the new deaths are entwined. Now she is helping - wait, this is Mallory - directing Illinois State Police and the FBI on the case, hoping to stop the killer before more people die.

Carol O'Connell's newest suspense novel was released in January. It is excellent. It would help to have read earlier novels in the series, but the book stands on its own. Mallory is a unique character and the earlier books help explain her. Find Me has done a good job at recapping what is needed to follow her through this tale.

The story line following the serial killer keeps the reader hooked. The suspense builds properly and the reader has lots of questions as the books continues. They are answered by the end. The final meeting between Mallory and the murder is unexpected; the end of the book has an extra twist. While I hope this isn't the end of Mallory's story, it could be. I want to know where she goes from here.

You can find more reviews for this new book at .

Notice: Violence

Mallory's Oracle
The Man Who Cast Two Shadows
Killing Critics
Stone Angel
Shell Game
Crime School
Dead Famous
Winter House
Find Me