The Book:
A Faint Cold Fear by Karin Slaughter
Published July 27th 2004 by HarperTorch
Date re-read: October 7, 2022
The Characters:
Sara Linton, Grant County pediatrician and coroner
Jeffrey Tolliver, her ex-husband, chief of police
Lena Adams
Buy it on Bookshop.org | Amazon
The Plot (from Goodreads):
Sara Linton, medical examiner in the small town of Heartsdale, Georgia, is called out to an apparent suicide on the local college campus. The mutilated body provides little in the way of clues — and the college authorities are eager to avoid a scandal — but for Sara and police chief Jeffrey Tolliver, things don’t add up.
Two more suspicious suicides follow, and a young woman is brutally attacked. For Sara, the violence strikes far too close to home. And as Jeffrey pursues the sadistic killer, he discovers that ex-police detective Lena Adams, now a security guard on campus, may be in possession of crucial information. But, bruised and angered by her expulsion from the force, Lena seems to be barely capable of protecting herself, let alone saving the next victim…
The title: I didn’t notice the title in the text, so if you know where it is please comment!
The Review:
A Faint Cold Fear is #3 in the Grant County series, taking place a year after Blindsighted. If you’ve been following along, I’m re-reading both the Grant County and Will Trent series in time for the newest Will Trent book coming in 2023–and recording spoilers for them this time around.
A Faint Cold Fear begins with an apparent suicide, but when multiple more deaths immediately follow, it becomes clear that there’s more to it than meets the eye.
I’m still not really on board with Jeffrey. He gave Sara a hard time about speaking to her ex while she was grieving at a hospital, so the tally of icky things he’s said continues. At the time of writing this review, though, I’ve already re-read Indelible as well. I’m a little more on board with this second chance after that one, but still can’t wait for Will.
Lena’s tricky. She’s easy to hate because she’s constantly making terrible decisions, but she has also been through a lot. I don’t think her experiences excuse her actions, though. In this book Lena has quit the police force and is now a security officer at Grant Tech, because her love for the bottle started to catch up to her. She also starts dating an abusive skinhead, so that’s fun.
Although I love every book in this series, A Faint Cold Fear has been one of my least favorites. That makes it hard to assign a star rating too, because I still enjoyed it far more than many other books, but to me it doesn’t hold up to my love for Blindsighted and Kisscut. As mentioned, though, I’m already on to the next one, and Indelible is one of my favorites!
If you’re looking for a matching set of the Grant County books, most of them are included in this set, which I purchased recently and love!
Grant County books in order
Blightsighted
Kisscut
A Faint Cold Fear
Indelible
Faithless
Beyond Reach
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