Publishers Weekly
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Edgar-winner Connelly’s entertaining if subpar third thriller featuring L.A. reporter Jack McEvoy (after 2009’s The Scarecrow) finds McEvoy, once a bestselling true crime author, working for FairWarning, an online news site that focuses on consumer fraud. He’s pulled back into the world of violent crime when he becomes a person of interest in the murder of Christina Portrero, with whom he had a one-night stand a year earlier. Portrero was killed by “internal decapitation,” her head having been twisted 180 degrees. McEvoy volunteers a DNA sample, confident he’ll be quickly cleared, though the LAPD homicide detectives on the case don’t welcome McEvoy’s subsequent probing of the murder. McEvoy gets a break when he posts a question on the unusual killing method on a forum used by medical examiners and learns that several other women have recently been killed the same way. His theory that one person is responsible for all the deaths is buttressed after he discovers another connection among the victims. Connelly keeps things moving briskly, but neither the plot nor the lead is up to his usual high standard, and he doesn’t stick the landing. Fans will hope for a return to form next time. Agent: Philip Spitzer, Philip G. Spitzer Literary. (May)

Kirkus
Copyright © Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

A first-rate case for Connelly’s third-string detective, bulldog journalist Jack McEvoy, who’s been biding his time since The Scarecrow (2009) as Harry Bosch and the Lincoln Lawyer have hogged the spotlight. The consumer-protection website FairWarning can’t hold a candle to the LA Times, where Jack once plied his trade. The real problem this time, though, is that the cops come to Jack rather than vice versa, as a person of interest who had a one-night stand a year ago with Christina Portrero, whose latest one-night stand broke her neck. In fact, Jack quickly discovers, Tina was only the most recent among a number of women who died of atlanto-occipital dislocation—several of them erroneously listed as accidents, all of them clients of the genetic testing firm GT23. Why would sending out your DNA for genetic information put you at enormously increased risk of falling victim to a brutal killer who calls himself the Shrike? The answer to the question of how “predators now can custom-order their victims,” which lies in the DRD4 gene, is guaranteed to make even the most hard-bitten readers queasy. Throughout his pursuit of the killer, the LAPD’s pursuit of him, and his unwilling partnerships with fellow journalist Emily Atwater and former FBI agent Rachel Walling, Jack works the case with a dogged professionalism, a mastery of detail, and a scarred but oversized heart that puts most of his police procedural cousins to shame. Darkly essential reading for every genre fan who’s ever considered sending a swab to a mail-order DNA testing service. Copyright © Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

Book list
From Booklist, Copyright © American Library Association. Used with permission.

Connelly's Harry Bosch is unquestionably one of the top dogs in today's crime-fiction world, but fans would be remiss to ignore the author's other lead characters, especially reporter Jack McEvoy, who has appeared in only two previous novels, but they are two of Connelly's best: The Poet and The Scarecrow. McEvoy makes it three for three with this riveting tale, which gives technology-wary types a whole new thing to worry about: tracking ancestry through DNA samples. McEvoy becomes a person of interest in the murder of a woman he dated only once. He's innocent, of course, but, intrigued by the case, he starts digging, finding multiple similar instances in which women killed in the same way all had recently submitted DNA to a particular genetic-analysis provider. Yes, the provider boasts that the samples remain anonymous, but after they are sold to a poorly regulated secondary market, control is lost. That shocking premise leads to an even more shocking serial killer who targets victims through a site on the dark web managed by DNA-hacking misogynists. So much for anonymity. Connelly's own roots in the newspaper business run deep, and he is at his best when he's showing reporters digging for a complex story. Combine that with a genuinely nightmarish scenario, and you have a truly terrifying thriller.HIGH-DEMAND BACKSTORY: The overwhelming success of Bosch, the Amazon original series now streaming its final season, has rubbed off on Connelly's novels. They've always been popular, but the last two were number-one New York Times best-sellers. Fair warning: here's three in a row.