Karin Slaughter | Undone (Will Trent #3)

Book spoilers ahead–if you haven’t yet read Undone, I suggest you turn back now.

The Spoilers

In the prologue, an elderly couple hits a woman in the road while driving home at night. A paramedic and his date stop to help before 911 could respond.

Sara has moved back to Atlanta to get away from Grant County and the memory of Jeffrey. It’s been three and a half years since Jeffrey died when Undone starts. She is working in the emergency department at Grady Hospital, and meets Faith and Will when they came into the emergency department after Faith passed out on the job.

While Faith was checking out, the first victim, “Anna”, was brought into Grady. Will took it upon himself to visit the crime scene, where he discovered the cave where Anna and another victim had been held. After an extensive search, they found the other victim, Jackie, in a tree. She had just recently died when she was found.

In another POV, another woman, Pauline, is kidnapped, presumably by the same serial killer. They also get another missing person report for Olivia.

At the autopsy, Pete Hanson and Sara found trash bags in Jackie’s vagina. When they check Anna, they find the same.

Angie knew something about Anna: one of her girls from her vice days knew about a crack den being set up in Anna’s house. Anna’s baby was hidden in the trash chute in the apartment. The doorman was arrested for looking the other way.

Eventually, Will interviews the date of the paramedic that stopped to help at the car crash where Anna was hit. He finds out that 911 took ages to respond and that the victim was taken away before the police got there. He also learns that Tom, the son of the elderly couple, had arrived at the scene of the crime before the police. 

Will calls Tom, who agrees to meet Will at his parents’ house to speak to him again. Judith (Tom’s mother) stabs Will, but Amanda arrives in time to save him.

At the same time, Tom tells Faith to meet him at Tom’s house. Tom isn’t there when Faith arrives, but Faith can tell something strange is going on with his wife. The wife tries to tase Faith, Tom attempts to subdue her, but Pauline had just broken out of the basement and together Faith and Pauline got control.

Tom was Pauline’s brother. He had always been a psychopath and had been assaulting and killing women since he was 12. Every time he got into trouble, Judith would move the family to a different state to protect him. Pauline ran away and changed her name, but Tom found her.

We never really found out what happened to Jeffrey: just that a pipe bomb had been placed in their mailbox and that the man responsible had died in prison, sparing Sara a court case. Sara blamed Lena, and was carrying around a letter Lena had written her.