Publisher's Weekly Review
In Barr's taut 13th thriller to feature Anna Pigeon (after 2004's High Country), the 50-ish National Park Service ranger leaves her new husband, Paul, back in Mississippi, to assume a new post in Colorado's Rocky Mountain National Park, where she encounters a serial killer and a strong, determined woman, Heath Jarrod, much like herself. Heath, a former ice climber now confined to a wheelchair after a near-fatal fall, feels depressed, isolated and helpless. She's camping in the national park with her physician, who's also her aunt, when a pair of battered young girls, two of three missing from a nearby religious retreat, appear at the campsite. Heath and Anna at first dislike one another, but join forces to break the silence enforced by the retreat's domineering head and discover why the youngsters vanished, who took them, where they were and what happened to the third girl. Barr skillfully weaves contemporary issues of parental responsibility, religious and political separatism, and sexual abuse into her harrowing story. She carefully sets the scene in the first part of the book, which builds to a spectacular climax that pits Anna against evil incarnate. Noted for her precise plotting and atmospheric descriptions of nature, Barr again proves her skill in putting believable characters in peril against a backdrop of breathtaking scenery. Agent, Dominick Abel. National author tour. (Mar. 24) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Library Journal Review
A massive search ensues when teenage girls disappear from a church group camping trip in Colorado's Rocky Mountain National Park. Six weeks later, two of the girls emerge, half-naked and traumatized, raising the question, "Where's the third girl?" Two women, park ranger Anna Pigeon and paraplegic camper Heath Jarrod, plunge into the renewed case. The girls profess amnesia, but whisper enough to put Robert Proffit, their youth group leader, under suspicion. They trust Heath and beg her to accompany them home to a remote, sinister-feeling, religious outpost. Meanwhile, Anna spends a night pinned under rocks after being pushed over a cliff by Robert, whose backpack just happens to be leaking fresh blood. Once freed, Anna can't gauge her staff's credibility, and her backcountry hunt becomes fiercely intense when a suspect turns up dead. The women's parallel stories unfold, finally intersecting in a terrifying conclusion. Although Barr's Anna Pigeon series (High Country) have set the standard for outdoor mysteries, her latest is an ambitous, if heavy-handed, attempt to do more; it's as laden with psychological issues (pedophilia, brainwashing) as any urban mystery. Still, fans will want it. For most mystery collections. Barr lives in Clinton, MS. [See Prepub Mystery, LJ 12/04.]-Teresa L. Jacobsen, Santa Monica P.L., CA (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
