Hunted

November 4, 2013
Heiter’s overblown debut introduces FBI special agent Evelyn Blaine, a profiling specialist in the FBI’s Behavioral Analysis Unit in Aquia, Va. When the bodies of two young female kidnapping victims are found on a farm in nearby Bakersville buried up to their necks, Evelyn is assigned to liaise with local police chief Tanner Caulfield. Evelyn is good at her job, despite lacking confidence in other aspects of her life, including in her attraction to FBI Hostage Rescue Team member Kyle McKenzie. She barely escapes a kidnapping attempt, perhaps by the very killer she’s chasing. She persists in her search to the point of obsession, tracing similar crimes like a case officer rather than a profiler and deliberately putting herself at risk. Too much focus on Evelyn’s fraught relationships with her boss, other FBI agents, and McKenzie distracts from the main action. Agent: Kevan Lyon, Marsal Lyon Literary Agency.

December 15, 2013
Rookie FBI profiler Evelyn Baine is called in to investigate a crime scene involving the Bakersville Burier, a serial killer whose calling card is leaving dead women half buried in the forests of Virginia. Although she is young and relatively inexperienced, her bosses think Evelyn has a knack for getting into the heads of the killers she is trackingbut this one eludes her, just as he eluded two previous FBI agents, who ended up dead. Is Evelyn next? When she is abducted (and released) early on, she initially doesn't connect it to her new case, a plot element that seems a little hard to swallow. Then pieces from Evelyn's past start coming back to herlike the time when her best friend was abducted when she was a preteen, and Evelyn should have been a victim as well. Right. There's an awful lot of predictable twists and coincidences here, but Heiter's characters are interesting, and the dialogue is realistic. Libraries where serial killer novels are popular might consider adding this debut novel, which is set to have a sequel.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2013, American Library Association.)