“People were outraged. They were glued to their televisions, to their web pages, to their Facebook feeds. They vocally expressed sorrow, horror, fury, pain. They cried for change. They raised money. They demanded action. And then they went back to their lives until the next one happened again.”
― Karin Slaughter, The Good Daughter
Book Title: The Good Daughter
Author: Karin Slaughter
Publication Date: 2017
Genres: Adult Fiction, Mystery, Legal Thriller
Goodreads Rating: 4.18 Stars
My Rating: 3.5 Stars
*I received this book for free from theSkimm in an Instagram contest!
Two girls are forced into the woods at gunpoint. One runs for her life. One is left behind…
Twenty-eight years ago, Charlotte and Samantha Quinn’s happy small-town family life was torn apart by a terrifying attack on their family home. It left their mother dead. It left their father — Pikeville’s notorious defense attorney — devastated. And it left the family fractured beyond repair, consumed by secrets from that terrible night.
Twenty-eight years later, and Charlie has followed in her father’s footsteps to become a lawyer herself — the ideal good daughter. But when violence comes to Pikeville again — and a shocking tragedy leaves the whole town traumatized — Charlie is plunged into a nightmare. Not only is she the first witness on the scene, but it’s a case that unleashes the terrible memories she’s spent so long trying to suppress. Because the shocking truth about the crime that destroyed her family nearly thirty years ago won’t stay buried forever…
1. Free books are the best books. I have never won an Instagram contest before, but when theSkimm popped into my DMs and said that I won a free book, I was pumped. If I’m going to win anything, I want it to be books!
2. On a thriller kick. I’m not usually into mysteries and thrillers — I usually pick up more realistic, contemporary reading. But recently, I’ve been reading more mysteries and really enjoying the fast pace and suspense. Plus, there’s been a string of mysteries coming out that feature kickass females as the lead detective or lawyer, and it’s throwing me back to my Nancy Drew days.
3. The suspense in this story! I love authors who do a slow reveal… sort of the opposite of dramatic irony. The characters know something happened. The authors know something happened. The reader has no clue what happened. This book lied to me. It manipulated me. It drew me in then pushed me away. But it does it so well that I couldn’t be mad at it. I just had to keep. on. reading.
4. Trigger warning. This book gets a bit graphic. I’ve read reviews from other books by Karin Slaughter, and all of them mention the gore. This book seems tame in comparison to those others, but it does get graphic. There’s a lot of murder, and a lot of blood. There was sexual assault, and there were bad words. It wasn’t the whole story, but if you’re squeamish, you probably want to skip over this one.
5. The characters though. I’m a sucker for a good growth story. Give me flawed, broken characters any day! These characters grow in a totally organic way. They come together then fall apart. They push people away, but break down when they lose support. It’s a beautiful story of redemption in the face of tragedy, coupled with some turns I didn’t really expect.
This book features characters that are flawed and dynamic and has a great legal drama that ties everything together in a surprise twist.
“It is a father’s job to love his daughter in the way that she needs to be loved.”
“I’ve always preferred crazy to stupid. Stupid can break your heart.”
“A trial is nothing but a competition to tell the best story. Whoever sways the jury wins the trial.”
“What a rapist takes from a woman is her future. The person she is going to become, who she is supposed to be, is gone. In many ways, it’s worse than murder, because he has killed that potential person, eradicated that potential life, yet she still lives and breathes, and has to figure out another way to thrive.”
“Sometimes, even if you know the answer, you’ve got to let the other person take a shot. If they feel wrong all the time, they never get the chance to feel right.”
“She had seen this before. She knew that you could put it all in a little box and close it up later, that you could go on with your life if you didn’t sleep too much, didn’t breathe too much, didn’t live too much so that death came back and snatched you away for the taking.”
“Nothing ever truly faded. Time only dulled the edges.”
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