Lisa Gardner’s Latest Thriller Is a Harrowing, Unputdownable Must-Read
From #1 New York Times bestselling author Lisa Gardner comes a bold new thriller that cements her mastery of the suspense genre. In Before She Disappeared, Gardner introduces Frankie Elkin, an indomitable investigator who specializes in locating missing person cases that have long been abandoned by law enforcement and the media cycle. But even Frankie couldn’t anticipate the disturbing request at the heart of this novel – to find the long-lost sister of one of the nation’s most notorious female serial killers.
The case was horrifically sensational when it broke. Dubbed “the Beautiful Butcher” by a salacious press, Kaylee Pierson confessed to luring eighteen men from bars before viciously murdering them. Though her backstory of being raised by an abusive father generated initial sympathy, it was quickly drowned out by overwhelming public revulsion at her brutal crimes. Now, with only three weeks until her execution date, Pierson has finally received a lead on her sister’s whereabouts over a decade after her kidnapping – but she needs Frankie’s unique skills to follow the trail.
The tantalizing offer – “When was the last time your search ended with finding the living?” – proves impossible for Frankie to resist. Her investigation soon leads her undercover at an isolated Pacific island base camp for a major tech mogul’s vanity project, the same man who was the prime suspect in five-year-old Leilani’s disappearance years ago. But Frankie quickly finds herself in a pressure cooker of secrets, lies, and looming danger as a monster storm sets in.
A novel of profound moral complexity, Before She Disappeared masterfully explores the psychological complexity of its characters on both sides of a horrific divide. Gardner ratchets up the tension with a steady, inexorable hand, planting a seemingly endless landmine of reversals and jaw-dropping revelations. The result is a harrowing, haunting, unputdownable read that reaffirms her status as one of the premiere thriller writers working today. This surefire bestseller is gripping from beginning to end.
