Lisa Unger, Sliver of Truth

Sliver of Truth

Lisa Unger

Shaye Areheart (Crown) Books, January 2007, $23.00

ISBN: 0307338460

New York City reporter Ridley Jones thinks she resolved the identity of her biological father, who was the now deceased Uncle Max Smiley, head of Project Rescue that saved abused children from nasty parents. Ridley was a rescued child placed in the home of Ben and Grace Jones, who adopted her. However, Ridley uncovers the fact that Project Rescue also abducted children from safe harmonious households to place them in the homes of clients.

Now FBI Agent Dylan Grace takes some photos from Ridley that shows Max or a doppelganger in the background of the pictures. The Feds seek Max, who they believe is alive, for his alleged abductions of women that he sells as sex slaves and his baby vending business. Dylan believes Ridley is the link that will lead him to the recently vanished New York Times journalist, Myra Lyall, whom the special agent thinks Max kidnapped to sell to the highest bidder.

Everyone, including Ridley, Dylan and her on and off boyfriend Jake seek to find Uncle Max, who is the apparent head of several nefarious rings. The storyline is action-packed from the moment that Ridley collects her photos in Manhattan, and it never slows down until the final confrontation. However, the motives of the key characters are difficult to fathom until late in the novel, even for those who read Ridley's previous discoveries about her parentage (see BEAUTIFUL LIES). Still, this is an engrossing thriller that has the audience soaring alongside the heroine on both sides of the Atlantic, as she tries to learn whether Uncle Max lives.