Karin Slaughter | Fallen (Will Trent #5)

The Book: 

Fallen by Karin Slaughter
Published June 22nd 2010 by Delacorte Press
Date re-read: December 15, 2022

The Characters: 

Will Trent, GBI agent

Faith Mitchell, Atlanta PD detective
Evelyn Mitchell
Sara Linton
Amanda Wagner, Will’s boss

Get it on Bookshop.org | Amazon


The Plot (from Goodreads):

There’s no police training stronger than a cop’s instinct. Faith Mitchell’s mother isn’t answering her phone. Her front door is open. There’s a bloodstain above the knob. Her infant daughter is hidden in a shed behind the house. All that the Georgia Bureau of Investigations taught Faith Mitchell goes out the window when she charges into her mother’s house, gun drawn. She sees a man dead in the laundry room. She sees a hostage situation in the bedroom. What she doesn’t see is her mother. 

“You know what we’re here for. Hand it over, and we’ll let her go.”

When the hostage situation turns deadly, Faith is left with too many questions, not enough answers. To find her mother, she’ll need the help of her partner, Will Trent, and they’ll both need the help of trauma doctor Sara Linton. But Faith isn’t just a cop anymore–she’s a witness. She’s also a suspect.

The thin blue line hides police corruption, bribery, even murder. Faith will have to go up against the people she respects the most in order to find her mother and bring the truth to light–or bury it forever.

Click here for book spoilers for Fallen
Book spoilers ahead–if you haven’t yet read Fallen, I suggest you turn back now.

Evelyn was the one who turned in her team in the narcotics division (in Triptych, Will had just come off a case investigating the team and Evelyn). Evelyn and Amanda had decided that it was safest to have Evelyn investigated just like everyone else and call the tip anonymous, so that Evelyn’s team wouldn’t turn on her.

Therefore, the team figured that Evelyn’s kidnapping was for revenge.

It turned out that it was for revenge, but not for the reasons Will and the team thought. The ringleader was actually Evelyn’s son, her lovechild with Hector. Hector had been a CI, and Evelyn slept with him when her marriage got boring. She was pregnant at the same time as Faith, but Evelyn gave the baby up without her children knowing.

The couple that Evelyn gave the baby to had agreed not to tell him, but he discovered the truth when his adoptive mother got sick and he couldn’t donate bone marrow. He tracked down Evelyn and began breaking into her house and rearranging her things. When he got caught with a lot of cocaine, Evelyn pulled a favor to reduce the charge. She sent him to rehab, where he met all the other guys involved with the kidnapping. They put together the story about Will’s investigation and assumed Evelyn had money hidden.

Angie and Will fought and he told Angie he was done with her for good. Sara and Will finally slept together.

The Ending:

Faith agreed to the kidnapper’s ransom demand, pretending Evelyn had the stolen money. When she went to do the exchange, Caleb (the kidnapper) told her that he was her brother. He didn’t care about the money, he had just lured her there to torture and kill both her and Evelyn. Will and Amanda were able to shoot Caleb through the window. Evelyn had been tortured, but she survived.

Will and Sara discussed their relationship. We learn the story of Will trying to kill himself: he and Angie were in a foster home where the father was abusing Angie, but no one believed her. Will cut his wrists to get someone to remove them from the home. He had to make the cuts deep enough to make them believable. So he had technically done it for Angie, but not the way Angie implied it to Sara. Will and Sara are officially together by the end of the book, but Angie is still tangentially in the picture.

The Review: 

In Fallen, we meet Faith’s mother Evelyn and learn more about the reason she left the police force. I forgot a lot about the characters’ backstories and how intricately they’re developed. This is why I always recommend that people read this series in order. There’s a lot you miss if you skip around or start with the more recently published books!

I enjoyed my re-read of Fallen no less than the others in the series, and it’s more of all the greatness Karin is known for. On to Criminal next!


I’ve also posted spoilers for all of the Grant County books, so check this link or the search bar to find what you’re looking for.

If you’re looking for a matching set of the Will Trent books, most of them are included in this set, which I purchased recently and love!

Will Trent books in order

*Once again, I do recommend starting with the Grant County books. See this post.

Triptych
Fractured
Undone (also titled Genesis)
Broken
Fallen
Snatched (novella)
Criminal
Busted (novella)
Unseen
The Kept Woman
Cleaning the Gold (novella)
The Last Widow
The Silent Wife
After That Night

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