Don't Talk to Strangers

May 5, 2014
Believable action and realistic characters distinguish Williams’s strong third novel featuring Atlanta-based PI Keye Street (after 2012’s Stranger in the Room). In the woods outside the small town of Whisper, Ga., the remains of two girls have been uncovered: Tracy Davidson disappeared more than a decade earlier, while Melinda Cochran vanished eight months before; each was 13 years old at the time she went missing. Sheriff Kenneth Meltzer wants Keye, a Chinese-American who was adopted by a white Southern family and who was fired from the FBI because of her alcoholism, to help build the killer’s psychological profile. Keye feels like a stranger in a strange town, where the other law enforcement officials are outright hostile to her and the residents veer from trying to assist her investigation to shutting her out of discussions. Readers will empathize with this flawed but gutsy detective. Agent: Victoria Sanders, Victoria Sanders & Associates.

May 15, 2014
An erudite investigator is an outsider in the small town where she's been hired to catch a child predator.Talented and ambitious, Dr. Keye Street was in the process of working her way up the food chain at the National Center for the Analysis of Violent Crime when her drinking put the brakes on her career. Now that Keye has a few years of recovery behind her, she's settled into a more sedate life as the head of her own firm, Corporate Intelligence & Investigations. Although much of the business relies on bail jumpers and background checks, the phone still rings sometimes with a special case that needs Keye's expertise. When Sheriff Meltzer calls to ask Keye to investigate a child predator in the rural town of Whisper, Georgia, she gets a familiar feeling of excitement. Admittedly, this feeling is only partially about figuring out what kind of person would abduct two teenage girls 10 years apart; Keye's hit a bit of a rut with her boyfriend, Rauser, and is aching for a chance to head out of town. Once Keye arrives in Whisper, she's shunned by the local cops, who are insulted that Meltzer has contracted out their job to an outsider. But Keye's fresh perspective might just be what's needed, since the more seasoned cops' personal knowledge of the families involved has led them to overlook key pieces of evidence. The abduction of another girl forces Keye to come up with fast answers before another body is added to the count.All the twists and turns readers of Williams (Stranger in the Room, 2012, etc.) have come to expect, though the sketchy development of the minor characters makes the big reveal less effective.

COPYRIGHT(2014) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.

Starred review from May 1, 2014
Keye Street has made a name for herself in catching serial killers even after getting fired as an FBI behavioral analyst for being a drunk. So when Sheriff Ken Meltzer of Silas, Georgia, finds the bodies of two 13-year-old girls, killed a decade apart, at the same dump site, he asks Street to consult. She's met with overt hostility by members of Meltzer's department, as an outsider interfering with their case, and she stands out as an Asian American, attracting attention throughout the small town. She also piques the interest of the perpetrator, who sends messages to her while snatching another 13-year-old girl. Desperate to save the life of the latest victim, Streetfour years soberalso is fighting her desire for a drink and a strong mutual attraction for Meltzer, even though she loves the man she left at home, Atlanta PD officer Aaron Rauser. The third entry in this compelling series features an increasingly suspenseful plot with some delicious final twists. But this is most notable as character-driven crime fiction with a flawed, damaged, Krispy Kremeloving protagonist who continues to fight her own demons as she tracks a psychopath who blends into the background. A superlative series.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2014, American Library Association.)

September 15, 2013

This second in the Keye Street series follows Stranger in 77th Room, a Shamus Award nominee that got top-ten honors nationwide. Here, former FBI profiler Keye Street is asked to investigate the murders of several young women in the woods 90 miles from Atlanta. Lots of foreign rights sales.

Copyright 2013 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.