Book Review: Retribution

Reviewed By: Gina Metz - RAM

Retribution     Amazon US PB Amazon US HC Amazon Canada PB Amazon Canada HC
Jilliane P. Hoffman
Class/Genre:   Mystery   Woman Main Character   Thriller   Legal Setting   Serial Killer
Series: C.J. Townsend and Dominick Falconetti
Putnam; 2004; 416pp
Chloe Larson was a young, beautiful blonde preparing to take the bar exam and become a lawyer with a full life including a boyfriend who was also a successful attorney whom she hoped to marry. A few weeks before she is to take the bar exam she is brutally raped & cut up by a sociopath in a clown mask who breaks into her apartment one night. During the all night ordeal she also learns that he has been stalking her and knows nearly all the intimate details of her life. The rapist was never caught, continues to stalk Chloe and Chloe’s life crumbles around her and drives her to a breakdown.
The story jumps ahead approximately twelve years to Florida. There C.J. Townsend works in the district attorney’s office and is assigned to the Major Crimes Unit. She has been working for the past year with Florida Department of Law Enforcement Special Agent Dominick Falconetti, who is head of a task force searching for a vicious serial killer. The killer is dubbed cupid and picks up beautiful blonde women in night clubs and proceeds to kill them and remove their hearts while they are still alive.
When a cupid suspect is arrested, C.J.’s world starts to fall apart again as she immediately recognizes the voice of the man who brutally raped her twelve years earlier. C.J.’s world that she has carefully reconstructed is about to be tested to see if she has what it takes to make it through this.
The statute of limitations has expired on the crime committed against C.J. in her earlier life in New York. If she lets anyone know that he is her rapist, she will be removed from the case and she is afraid that this far into it, if they change prosecutors he is liable to walk away a free man. Thus C.J. must decide whether to keep quiet and continue and whether she can handle the enormous strain of the case without anther breakdown or the risk of her rapist being free to come after her again.
I found this to be a wonderful debut novel and quite a page turner. There are some graphic details but none more than necessary. I certainly look forward to future books by this author.

Gina Metz - RAM

Reprinted with permission. Do Not repost without permission from the author, Gina Metz - RAM

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