#1 New York Times bestselling author of Mississippi Blood and The Bone Tree keeps the secrets of the South alive in this "powerful...heartfelt...entirely gripping" (The Washington Post) novel of infatuation, murder, and sexual intrigue set in his hometown of Natchez, Mississippi.
When the nude body of a beautiful young female student is found near the Mississippi River, the entire community is shocked—but...

At first there was no reason to link the killings. The first one, months earlier, seemed totally random: a lump of concrete pushed off an overpass onto a passing car. By contrast, the gruesome bludgeoning death of Amber Marshalson, returning home late from a night out clubbing with friends, was obviously calculated. The killer had been seen waiting for the girl in a nearby wood. But when Chief Inspector Wexford discovers that Amber had been the driver...

When fifteen-year-old Lucinda Hayes is found dead in her sleepy Colorado suburb, the secret lives of three people connected to her are revealed: the social outcast who loved her from afar, the jaded girl who despised her, and the policeman investigating her death.

Counseling a rape victim to tell the police what happened in spite of the attacker's threats, Frieda Klein is horrified when the young girl turns up dead in a case that exposes dark community secrets and unfinished business in Frieda's own life.