Bestseller Slaughter's tense and densely plotted thriller, the fifth to merge her Atlanta-based characters with those in Georgia's fictional Grant County (after 2012's Criminal), focuses on stubborn Lena Adams, a Macon police detective and the woman that Dr. Sara Linton-the girlfriend of Georgia Bureau of Investigation agent Will Trent-blames for her husband Jeffrey's murder years earlier. Lena, now married to Jeffrey's son from his first marriage, is hot on the trail of a local drug kingpin, Sid Waller. Sent undercover to assist in the investigation, Will adopts the persona of tough ex-con Bill Black, all unbeknownst to Sara. But Will's secret suddenly becomes harder to keep when Lena and her fellow officer husband, Jared, are attacked in their home, leaving Jared clinging to life and bringing Sara from Atlanta to Macon to see her stepson. The twisted plot and shocking reveals remind readers why Slaughter remains a dominant voice in crime fiction. Agent: Victoria Sanders, Victoria Sanders & Associates. (July) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.

In the seventh novel (after Criminal) to feature Georgia Bureau of Investigation agent Will Trent, we find him working undercover as an ex-con trying to infiltrate a drug and sex trafficking ring in order to get to the ultimate prize: a powerful and elusive man called Big Whitey who has expanded business in the Macon area. Meanwhile, an attack on Det. Lena Adams and her husband has left him gravely injured and may have something to do with a recent raid, led by Lena, that went horribly wrong. As Will navigates this particularly brutal world of drug dealers and pimps, he must also balance his job with his still tentative romance with Dr. Sara Linton, who becomes inexorably involved in the case. -VERDICT The grim reality of human trafficking and the drug trade in the South is explored in this superb and emotionally wrenching thriller, and the despicable nature of the crimes being investigated only serves to enhance Will's innate goodness and humanity. Current series fans will be delighted, and newcomers to Slaughter's work will find a new obsession. [See Prepub Alert, 2/15/13; tie-in to Slaughter's Save the Libraries events.]-Kristin Centorcelli, Denton, TX (c) Copyright 2013. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

Georgia Bureau of Investigation agent Will Trent's undercover assignment leads predictably to more action-fueled heartache for him and the rest of Slaughter's continuing cast. Will's exacting boss, Deputy Director Amanda Wagner, has recreated Will as bad-boy Bill Black in the hope of getting information that could help shut down the operations of Big Whitey, a legendary (or perhaps nonexistent) Florida gangster whose tentacles have extended further north. Will has made good progress in worming himself into the confidences of petty crook Tony Dell and his stepsister Cayla Martin, a trashy pharmacy nurse with access to exactly the sorts of drugs that Big Whitey supplies to his clients. But Will's friends in the Macon Police Department know nothing about his undercover work, and he's constantly threatened with exposure or violence by their own activities. As usual, Slaughter (Criminal, 2012, etc.) gets things off to a supercharged start with an opening scene in which three men break into the home of two Macon officers, Detective Lena Adams and her husband, Jared Long, and open fire on Jared--a scene that ends with the shocking revelation that the third housebreaker is Will. The rest of the tale revolves around the widening gulf between Lena and Jared's stepmother, Dr. Sara Linton, who considers wild-child Lena responsible for Jared's shooting, as the GBI and the Macon cops try to smoke out Big Whitey. This time around, however, Slaughter keeps leaping from one time frame to another, so characters who've been wounded or killed in previous chapters return in perfect health to discuss their strategy or cross swords with each other. As lurid and sanguinary as any of Lena and Will's earlier cases but a lot more distractingly kaleidoscopic, as generic professional criminals battle for attention with the far more compelling histrionics of series regulars.]] Copyright Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

Georgia Bureau of Investigation agent Will Trent is undercover in Macon, hoping to finally corner elusive criminal mastermind Big Whitey. The notorious high-level drug dealer uses the same blueprint in every town he moves in on, infiltrating the local drug scene, injecting plenty of cash, and retaining a retinue of first-rate lawyers. The result? A bunch of low-level thugs are turned into businessmen, and crime goes up while prosecutions go down. Will crosses paths with Detective Lena Adams, whom he had previously investigated for reckless conduct and who has just endured a brutal raid on a dealer's house that saw multiple gunshot victims on both sides of the law. Meanwhile, Will's relationship with Sara Linton deepens, although he must face his own intimacy issues, which are the result of years of abuse suffered while in foster care. Slaughter plunges readers into the action from the get-go with her electrifying ability to write suspenseful, riveting confrontations between cops and criminals, all while deepening the backstories of her longtime series leads. Another intense read, on multiple levels, from the ever-reliable Slaughter. HIGH-DEMAND BACKSTORY: The eighth entry in Karin Slaughter's best-selling Will Trent series is backed up by a national advertising campaign, including a tie-in to Save the Libraries events.--Wilkinson, Joanne Copyright 2010 Booklist