Book Review for HIDE AND SEEK by Mary Burton

22/4/2019

She’s hunting. He’s watching.

Special Agent Macy Crow is a survivor. After a vicious hit-and-run nearly kills her, she gets right back to work, and now she’s gunning for a spot on the FBI’s elite profiling team. As an audition, she offers to investigate the recently discovered bones of Tobi Turner, a high school girl who disappeared fifteen years ago.

While investigating with local sheriff Mike Nevada, a former colleague and onetime lover, Macy discovers a link between Tobi’s case and several others that occurred around the same time as her disappearance. As Macy interviews victims and examines old cases, she uncovers a sinister picture of a stalker who graduated to sexual assault—and then murder.

Macy and Nevada race to put this monster behind bars before he can come out of hiding. But the murderer’s had years to hone his skills, and soon Macy herself becomes a target. She’s no stranger to pain and terror, but will Macy’s first profiling case be her last?

There is no doubt that Mary Burton knows how to build an eerie, scary, riveting murder mystery thriller that will give you the chills, that will scare you to check your locks and windows, and under your bed, because that boogieman does not only belong to the childhood nightmares anymore...
The constant twists, that each intensifies the investigation, caused me to be clued into the book. The case is grisly and the smalltown aspect where everyone knows everyone, the killer lurking right around the corner, just makes it even more frightening and intimidating.
Part of the story is told from the culprit's point of view part from the victims pov, and part from the investigators pov. Like I have said many times, that multiple points of views can make a mystery horrendously gruesome. And when the crimes are violence against women, including detailed rape scenes, that definitely can be too much for some readers, even if they are not normally triggered by that kind of scenes, cause there was a time in the story that I felt uncomfortable, to my bones.
The story has some physical attraction elements to represent romance, and for personally, it wasn't quite enough. The former lovers meet again in this investigation, and the attraction and lust are still there. Special Agent Macy Crow and sheriff Mike Nevada do care for each other, I would say Mike more so than Macy, and they act on their attraction towards each other, but two sex scenes does not a romance make... I wish this wouldn't be categorized as a romantic suspense but a thriller (with some romantic elements).
Their teamwork was flawless, they appreciate and respect each other as law enforcement agents, and they are comfortable with each other, in all the different kind of situations the investigation brings on them. I liked both of them, I admired them, they had guts, they were humble, honest, hardworking people, stubborn to get to the truth, putting the case as a number one priority in their lives.
All the local people that were introduced, as well as the team members that walked through the scenes of the story, were intriguing and interesting characters, well contributing to the tale and to the many turns in the pulsating plot.
A suspense-mystery that kept me on the edge, a horrid thriller of a serial rapist escalating into a killer is an arresting, engrossing start to the new series. Can't imagine the depths of fright this series will bring us. Is it weird to say - I can't wait to be scared to death again?!
~ Four Spoons

Mary Burton loves writing suspense, researching law enforcement and forensic procedures, morning walks, baking, books, and tiny dachshunds. She also enjoys hunting down serial killers, which she does in her New York Times and USA Today bestselling novels of suspense and romance. Library Journal has compared her work to that of Lisa Jackson and Lisa Gardner, and Fresh Fiction likened her writing to that of James Patterson.

Mary is routinely featured among the top twenty writers in Amazon's Author Rankings for romantic suspense, and her recent novel The Last Move claimed the number ten fiction slot in the Kindle eBooks Store.

Research is a favorite part of Mary's day. She never tires of learning more about police work, evidence collection and analysis. She's known for taking a hands-on approach, whether it means interviews with professionals in the field, forensic seminars or lessons at the firing range.

A Richmond native, Mary has lived there for most of her life. She is a graduate of Virginia's Hollins University and worked in marketing before she began writing full time. Her first book was published in 2000 and she's now the author of thirty-four published novels, five novellas and four works of contemporary women's fiction written as Mary Ellen Taylor.

A member of International Thriller Writers, Sisters in Crime, Mystery Writers of America, Novelists, Inc., and Romance Writers of America, Mary is known for creating multiple suspense stories connected by characters, such as her recent The Forgotten Files novels. Her new book, Her Last Word, and The Last Move, break that mold.

When not traveling for research or visiting with readers at bookstores, book festivals and conferences, Mary remains very much a homebody. She and her husband spend time alternately enjoying and lamenting their empty nest and spoiling their four-legged babies Buddy, Bella and Tiki.