Indelible (Grant County #4) – Karin Slaughter

Genre: Mystery, Thriller
Publisher: William Morrow
Pages: 360
Release Date: 2004

 

Haven’t read the previous novels in the series? Check out my reviews for Blindsighted, Kisscut, and A Faint Cold Fear.

 

An officer is shot point-blank in the Grant County police station and police chief Jeffrey Tolliver is wounded, setting off a terrifying hostage situation with medical examiner Sara Linton at the center. Working outside the station, Lena Adams, newly reinstated to the force, and Frank Wallace, Jeffrey’s second in command, must try to piece together who the shooter is and how to rescue their friends before Jeffrey dies. For the sins of the past have caught up with Sara and Jeffrey — with a vengeance …

 

 

For most of the Grant County series so far, Slaughter has focused almost solely on the female characters, namely Sara and Lena. With Indelible, Slaughter gives readers an intimate look at Jeffery and his past.

Indelible is told from the past and present as Slaughter slowly weaves the two narratives together. The past chapters give readers a glimpse of the beginning of Sara and Jeffery’s relationship as they take a vacation to Florida, but detour to Jeffrey’s hometown. In my review of the previous novel, A Faint Cold Fear, I wrote that I wasn’t the biggest fan of Jeffery as a character and I’m still not after Indelible, though I appreciate him and what Slaughter has accomplished with his development all the more.

Indelible reads like two Slaughter novels in one. In the present chapters, readers get to experience a pulse pounding hostage situation. While in the past chapters, readers get the typical Slaughter experience, an impeccably woven mystery with a shocking reveal. Indelible demonstrates Slaughter’s versatility as an author. Most of her novels are slower paced as readers simmer in the mystery and characters. However, the present chapters of Indelible are erratic, exciting, and nerve inducing as the danger never relents.

Overall, Indelible is easily one of the best novels of the Grant County series so far. Slaughter changes up her formula by giving readers more of Jeffery and a pulse pounding mystery that does not relent.

 

Have you read Indelible? What did you think?