This is the second book in the Badlands Thriller series - I haven’t read the first, and while I was able to pick up pretty well who was who and what had previously happened to them from context, I think I was missing a lot of emotional depth for detective Kylie Milliard and ED nurse Lily Baker, who appear to have been the main characters of the first book. They’re joined here by Hannah Visser, a 14-year-old girl who arrived to her babysitting job high and hoping the clients wouldn’t notice - only to witness their brutal murder. Too frightened to go to the police, Hannah stole a car and fled the scene, and now Kylie must track her down… before the killer cleans up the only witness to his crimes.
I’m probably going to go back and read White Out, because I really liked both Kylie and Lily and I very much wanted to know more of Lily’s backstory. Lily herself doesn’t have clear memories of the time she spent as a prisoner of a brutal serial killer, and what happens in this book does clarify some of those events for her, as well as bring her into a family she didn’t know she had. Although Hannah seems at the beginning to be an entitled, troubled teen - taking drugs when she’s responsible for a baby definitely had me side-eyeing her - it eventually becomes clear that she’s trying her best and there are circumstances which have led her down dark paths, and by the end I was definitely rooting for her.
This is an excellent, intriguing thriller with some strong and fascinating female characters at the heart of it. Even without having read the first book, I’ll happily give it five stars, but I do think it’s probably best if you don’t launch into the series here.
Disclaimer: I received a review copy of this title via NetGalley.
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