Shattered by Allison Brennan

Author: Allison Brennan
Series: #4 in the Max Revere series
Genre: Romantic Suspense
Publisher: Minotaur Books; Reprint edition (August 22, 2017)
Source: Library Find
Rating: ☕☕☕☕

Synopsis: Over a span of twenty years, four boys have been kidnapped from their bedrooms, suffocated, and buried nearby in a shallow grave. Serial killer or coincidence?

That’s the question investigative reporter Maxine Revere sets out to answer when an old friend begs her to help exonerate his wife, who has been charged with their son’s recent murder. But Max can do little to help because the police and D.A. won’t talk to her—they think they have the right woman. Instead, Max turns her attention to three similar cold cases. If she can solve them, she might be able to help her friend.

Justin Stanton was killed twenty years ago, and his father wants closure—so he is willing to help Max with her investigation on one condition: that she work with his former sister-in-law— Justin’s aunt, FBI Agent Lucy Kincaid. Trouble is, Max works alone, and she’s livid that her only access to the case files, lead detective and witnesses depends on her partnering with a federal agent on vacation. She wants the career-making story almost as much as the truth—but if she gets this wrong, she could lose everything.

Haunted by Justin’s death for years, Lucy yearns to give her family—and herself—the closure they need. More important, she wants to catch a killer. Lucy finds Max’s theory on all three cases compelling—with Max's research added to Lucy’s training and experience, Lucy believes they can find the killer so justice can finally be served. But the very private Lucy doesn’t trust the reporter any more than Max trusts her.

Max and Lucy must find a way to work together to untangle lies, misinformation, and evidence to develop a profile of the killer. But the biggest question is: why were these boys targeted? As they team up to find out what really happened the night Justin was killed, they make a shocking discovery: Justin’s killer is still out there … stalking another victim … and they already may be too late.

My Thoughts: This series just gets better and better.

The Good: With this book Allison Brennan brought in the star of her Lucy Kincaid series into Max's world. I have not read any of the Lucy Kincaid books and now I really want to. Max doesn't really work well with others and to see her have to work with an FBI agent was a great way to move Max's character forward. Lucy is a mystery to Max and Max doesn't do well with mysteries. She needs answers and with Lucy she can't get those answers. This is where you see Max really maturing even more than in the last few books. She lives with it. I liked seeing Max realizing she wanted more from her life as well.

The plot was pretty straight forward but kind of took a little back seat to the characters of Lucy and Max. I'm so character driven so I didn't hate this and if there were slow parts or flaws in the plot I never noticed. The actual story of boys being murdered was pretty intense and I really liked it a lot. Even though we know who the killer was through a large portion of the book the investigation was still riveting.

The Bad: There was quite a bit of repetition in regards to Lucy's background that was an irritant. Since I had not read any of the Lucy Kincaid books this was new information to me but it is told and told again and if you didn't get it the first dozen times it is told again. All of this was strictly for the reader as Max had no knowledge of Lucy's traumatic past and the book ended with her still in the dark about it. Had I gone into this book having read the Lucy books this repetition would have been even worse.

Another thing some people would find as a negative in this book would be the lack of romance. Sure Lucy and her husband, Sean, have an amazing relationship but Max's romance was completely lacking in this book. There is no sex and barely even any communication between Max and the man she has been dating since the end of book 1.

In a Nutshell: I love this series and can't wait for the next book to come out. Until I can get my hands on the next book once it's published I'm happy to be able to read more about Lucy Kincaid. I'd recommend people who like Romantic Suspense to read these Max Revere books but don't let her abrasive personality in the first book stop you from continuing on. This series is good.