The Chalk Girl (A Mallory Novel)

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Killing Critics (Kathleen Mallory Novels)

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NYPD sergeant Kathleen Mallory - computer genius, street fighter, provocative waif, peerless investigator, manipulative beauty - is the gorgeous, near-sociopathic heroine of this knife-edged suspense novel. Along with old pals, Ricker, Coffey, and faithful admirer Charles Butler, Mallory is determined to solve the brutal "art as death" murder of an untalented but highly touted artist-critic. Mallory believes the case is the work of the same killer who, 12 years earlier, hacked a young artist and a talented ballerina to pieces. Baffling and intricate, Mallory wades through art critics, bag ladies, madmen and mafioso alike in getting to the bottom of these crimes. Secrets, very deep and very dark, emerge and strike closer and closer to home. By the end, she will come to know the truth - but the truth may be the most dangerous illusion of all.

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The Judas Child

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It is three days before Christmas, and two young girls have disappeared from the local academy. This hasn't happened for fifteen years, since Rouge Kendall's twin sister was murdered. The killer was found, but now Rouge, twenty-five and a policeman, is forced to wonder: was he really the one? Also wondering is a former classmate named Ali Cray, a forensic psychologist with scars of her own. The pattern is the same, she says: a child called out to meet a friend. The friend is the bait, the Judas child, and is quickly killed. But the primary victim lives longer. . .until Christmas day. Rouge doesn't want to hear this. He's spent the last fifteen years trying to avoid the memories. A little girl has haunted his dreams all these years - and he has three days to finally put her to rest. Filled with rich prose, resonant characters, and knife-edged suspense that have won so many fans, Judas Child is Carol O'Connell's most powerful novel yet.

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Readers familiar with Mallory, the intriguing and original heroine of O'Connell's four previous suspense novels, will recognize familiar themes of loss and abandonment in the brilliant, enigmatic forensic psychologist Ali Cray, whose scarred face only hints at the emotional residue of a childhood trauma. Ali ties the mysterious disappearance of two young girls to the rape and murder long ago of Susan Kendall, the twin sister of a small-town New York policeman, Rouge. Realizing that the priest who was convicted of Susan Kendall's murder is probably innocent, Rouge has a personal as well as professional reason for joining Ali in tracking down Susan's killer before he completes the ritual murder of at least one of the missing girls.

The protagonists of Judas Child are direct literary descendants of Mallory, the author's earlier creation; like her, their childhood suffering illuminates their adult character and motivation. But while Mallory can only react to the past, Rouge and Ali find in each other a mirror that lights up the dark corners of their past and frees them of the survivor guilt both suffer. O'Connell's same penetrating psychological insight animates the novel's other characters: Dr. Mortimer Cray, Ali's uncle, a psychiatrist who bears the awful burden of knowing who the killer is but is constrained by professional ethics from revealing it; gutsy, clever Sadie Green, the Judas child of the title, and her irritating, annoying, desperate mother, Becca; FBI agent Arnie Pyle, who's dying to know how Ali got her scar; and Father Paul Marie, jailed for 15 years for a crime he may not have committed. The opening sentence grabs the reader, and doesn't let go till the last page. In her skilled rendering of psychological suspense, O'Connell is on a par with Barbara Vine and Frances Fyfield; like Jonathan Kellerman, she is also an astute observer of children, especially those who survive the most terrifying youthful traumas and betrayals. Judas Child may be O'Connell's "breakout" book, and it will surely send readers who've just discovered her in search of her backlist while they await her next one. --Jane Adams

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Mallory's Oracle (Kathleen Mallory Novels)

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Escaping from the streets of New York when a kind police sergeant takes her in, Kathleen Mallory grows up to become a proud member of the NYPD and embarks on a dangerous case to find her father's murderer. Reprint. AB. K.

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Crime School (Kathleen Mallory Novels)

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Police Detective Kathleen Mallory recognized the crime scene: victim hanging, hair in mouth, fire burning. It happened twenty-one years ago, when Mallory was a child. She also recognized the victim...

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Mallory, the feral street urchin adopted by an understanding police detective, grew up to be a tough, formidable cop herself, and in the five earlier thrillers featuring her exploits, Carol O'Connell has dropped few clues about her early life. Crime School fills in the blanks with this complex tale about Mallory's efforts to solve the attempted murder of the knife-wielding prostitute who once sheltered and later betrayed her--a copycat crime nearly identical to another that occurred two decades ago. Fans of this series and its unique, complicated, steely protagonist will welcome O'Connell back to the bestseller lists after a protracted absence, while those who've been waiting for the emergence of a kinder, gentler Mallory, able to return the affections of those who love her--like Charles Butler, the quirky criminologist whose unrequited adoration of Mallory knows no bounds, and her partner, Riker, who's known her since his old friend Markowitz plucked her off the streets--may be disappointed. --Jane Adams

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Police Detective Kathleen Mallory recognized the crime scene: victim hanging, hair in mouth, fire burning. It happened twenty-one years ago, when Mallory was a child. She also recognized the victim...

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Bone by Bone

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A stunning stand-alone novel from the national-bestselling author who “has raised the standard for psychological thrillers” (Chicago Tribune).

Carol O’Connell’s most recent Mallory novel, Find Me, was one of the most highly praised suspense novels of the year. “A terrific find: a tightly wrapped, expert combination of suspense, mystery and show-stopping character” (Janet Maslin of The New York Times); “yet another example of the spot-on talents of one of America’s finest writers of mysteries” (Milwaukee Journal Sentinel). In Bone by Bone, however, she may have written her most unforgettable novel yet.

In the northern California town of Coventry, two teenage brothers go into the woods one day, but only one comes back. No one knows what happened to the younger brother, Josh, until twenty years later, when the older brother, Oren, now an ex-investigator for the Army CID, returns to Coventry for the first time in many years. His first morning back, he hears a thump on the front porch. Lying in front of the door is a human jawbone, the teeth still intact. And it is not the first such object, his father tells him. Other remains have been left there as well. Josh is coming home . . . bone by bone.

Using all his investigative skills, Oren sets out to solve the mystery of his brother’s murder, but Coventry is a town full of secrets and secret-keepers: the housekeeper with the fugitive past, the deputy with the old grudge, the reclusive ex-cop from L.A., the woman with the title of town monster, and, not least of all, Oren himself. But the greatest secret of all belonged to his brother, and it is only by unraveling it that Oren can begin to discover the truth that has haunted them all for twenty years.

Written with the rich prose, resonant characters, and knife-edge suspense that have won the author so many fans, Bone by Bone is further proof that “O’Connell is one of the most poetic yet tough-minded writers of the genre” (San Francisco Chronicle).

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