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A review by ncrabb
Hunted by Elizabeth Heiter
3.0
It's clearly the nasty rut into which I've fallen, but I'm so, so tired of books where the female protagonist feels constantly insecure and so vulnerable that she must at all times never show a nanosecond's worth of vulnerability or even much of a human emotion aside from a kind of hybrid manly prickliness that goes away when the muscle-bound gun-waving cop or special agent boyfriend rescues her. I get insecurity, trust me. I have a unique understanding of how assumptions and biases in the workplace can be a nasty current through which to swim. But sometimes, it gets a bit much even for me to read these books where the female protagonist behaves all-too predictably.
When she was a child, Evelyn Baine's best friend was kidnapped and never heard from again. It was clear, based on the note the kidnapper left, that Evelyn was to have been taken along with her friend or in place of her. That knowledge, combined with Evelyn's burning desire to solve her friend's case, drove her to become an FBI profiler--not just any profiler, but one of the best.
She is given a case to solve that is particularly horrifying. She must help capture the Bakersville Burier, so named because he leaves his victims half buried in the woods with their heads showing after he has carved perfect circles in their chests.
Lest anyone assume I'm somehow unfair or overly harsh regarding the Evelyn Baine character, I should assure you that I actually liked her a great deal. She is a woman of mixed race who, by virtue of her intelligence and work ethic, earned the respect of her fellow agents, even that of a condescending supervisor who threatens to pull her from the case because of her emotional involvement in it.
But Evelyn has a right to be somewhat emotionally involved in the case. She was temporarily abducted by the Bakersville Burier, drugged, and almost killed. But her own knowledge of how suspects like this one would behave and her hours of endurance training helped her escape and return to her job.
But the killer isn't done with her. He's biding his time, waiting, watching, until that moment when the hunter will become the hunted.
I enjoyed this book enough to want to read the second book in the series, which I suspect I'll get to soon. I didn't predict in advance who the Bakersville Burier was, and I had the book speeded up to my player's maximum potential in an effort to get to the end without prolonged hyperventilation. Elizabeth Heiter is a talented author who knows how to lubricate the plot with just the right amount of creepiness factor to keep you turning pages.
When she was a child, Evelyn Baine's best friend was kidnapped and never heard from again. It was clear, based on the note the kidnapper left, that Evelyn was to have been taken along with her friend or in place of her. That knowledge, combined with Evelyn's burning desire to solve her friend's case, drove her to become an FBI profiler--not just any profiler, but one of the best.
She is given a case to solve that is particularly horrifying. She must help capture the Bakersville Burier, so named because he leaves his victims half buried in the woods with their heads showing after he has carved perfect circles in their chests.
Lest anyone assume I'm somehow unfair or overly harsh regarding the Evelyn Baine character, I should assure you that I actually liked her a great deal. She is a woman of mixed race who, by virtue of her intelligence and work ethic, earned the respect of her fellow agents, even that of a condescending supervisor who threatens to pull her from the case because of her emotional involvement in it.
But Evelyn has a right to be somewhat emotionally involved in the case. She was temporarily abducted by the Bakersville Burier, drugged, and almost killed. But her own knowledge of how suspects like this one would behave and her hours of endurance training helped her escape and return to her job.
But the killer isn't done with her. He's biding his time, waiting, watching, until that moment when the hunter will become the hunted.
I enjoyed this book enough to want to read the second book in the series, which I suspect I'll get to soon. I didn't predict in advance who the Bakersville Burier was, and I had the book speeded up to my player's maximum potential in an effort to get to the end without prolonged hyperventilation. Elizabeth Heiter is a talented author who knows how to lubricate the plot with just the right amount of creepiness factor to keep you turning pages.