The Good Daughter, by Karin Slaughter

Staff review by Chris Saliba

Two crimes, twenty-eight years apart, need to solved. Two sisters, their lives ruined by murder, haven't spoken to each other in two decades. Karin Slaughter's new thriller will have you in its thrall.

1989, North Georgia, the small town of Pikeville. The Quinn family have lost a considerable amount of money. Rusty, a lawyer and father of the family, can't help but take on legal cases that no one else will touch: rapists, brutal murderers and other low lifes. His legal bills are never getting paid and so the family has moved into an old farmhouse. One night, while Rusty is out, two men let themselves into the house. One of the men, Zachariah Culpepper, is known to Rusty. His intention is to murder Rusty, but confused and angry he kills Rusty's wife, Gamma. The two sisters, 13-year-old Charlotte (“Charlie”) and 16-year-old Samantha (“Sam”) witness the murder. They are dragged out into the woods by Zachariah, where some truly horrific things happen to them.

Twenty-eight years later. Both sisters are now practicing lawyers. Sam works in New York, while Charlie has remained in Pikeville. The relationship between the two sisters is deeply fractured. They have barely spoken to each other in two decades. A major drama changes that. Charlie manages to get caught up in a school shooting. Kelly Wilson, a baby-faced 17-year-old student who is lacking in intellectual development, has shot two people dead at the Pikeville middle school. Why did this apparently simple natured girl commit such a crime? As Rusty cannot take on the case due to a stint in hospital, both sisters must work together to find out what really happened. Many skeletons come out of the closet and grievances are aired until the sisters find healing and forgiveness.

I must confess to not reading any contemporary crime novels, but Karin Slaughter's muscular prose and expert sense of pacing and suspense grabbed me from the first page. I knew I didn't have a hope of resisting and would have to finish the book's 500 pages. While The Good Daughter is ostensibly a thriller, with two crimes at its heart that need solving, much of the story concentrates on the difficult relationship of the two sisters. You presume that the sisters would be close because of their shared trauma, but the opposite is the case. It takes the novel's considerable length to tease out all the difficulties of their relationship and finally achieve a reconciliation. At the heart of the Quinn sister's problems is a family secret one of the sisters, Charlie, has been forced to carry for most of her life. Hence the ironic title: Charlie is the good daughter, holding onto a secret for the good of the family, but destructive to herself.

The Good Daughter is quite an achievement. It's a complicated, multifaceted story that is brilliantly organised. There is a lot here for the reader to sink their teeth into. It's crime plot is rivetting, while the human drama of the two sisters is absorbing and emotionally satisfying. A thoroughly enjoyable read, but one that will also haunt you for days after you've finished it.

The Good Daughter, by Karin Slaughter. Published by HarperCollins. ISBN: 9781460751732 RRP: $32.99

Release date: 1st August 2017

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