When a young girl is abducted by a notorious serial killer, a woman risks her own life trying to save her. Mina is struggling to come to terms with her past. Having led a reclusive life, shunning human contact, she decides to take on a local college course to help get her life back on track.However, when a young girl who tries to befriend her is abducted by a serial killer, Mina feels … serial killer, Mina feels responsible. She refused to wait with the girl for her mother to pick her up. And she shrugged off the youngster’s fears.
Now Mina cannot rest until she finds out what happened. But as she probes into the events of that evening, her own nightmares start to return. She has put herself in danger, one that leads to an increasingly tense standoff with a cruel and vicious man who will stop at nothing.
Can she find the strength to stand up to her demons, past and present? And will she do so, even if it means risking everything?
CRUELTY’S DAUGHTER is the fifth novel by best-selling Australian author, Anna Willett. She writes in the thriller genre, with a touch of horror. Her books explore how women react to difficult situations. The books are full of tension, physical and psychological, and they are difficult to put down.
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This was an excellent read! I felt the tension and was kept on the edge of my seat, for the entire duration! I found myself completely gripped by the story and often caught myself reading ‘just one more chapter’ so that I could find out what was going to happen next.
The pace of the story was perfect, for the genre and writing style. It definitely helped to build up the tension and really make the whole of the book exciting. The author also brilliantly used certain moments to slow the pace, allowing me to stop, wonder and worry about where it was headed, as well as give us much needed details, to keep the story realistic and relatable.
The characters were really exciting, and were given plenty of detail, to really bring them to life. I liked this, as it really connected me to the main character and to her background, as well as connecting me to the girl she was searching for, throughout the read.
Overall, this was a brilliant book and I am very much looking forward to reading more from this author.
Wow, Cruelty’s Daughter is such an exciting, amazing book! It had me on the edge of my seat from start to finish, I couldn’t read it fast enough. Mina is such a strong, lead female character, I would love to read more about her. Expect the unexpected with so many twists and turns, I would love to see this turned into a movie. I highly recommend this book.
**Copy provided to Bayou Book Junkie for my reading pleasure in hopes of an unbiased opinion, a review was not a requirement.**
This is the first time I’ve read anything by this author, so I went into Cruelty’s Daughter with no expectations. I can tell you that this book was a complete surprise and a journey. This book is told by three POV’s, the first and majority by the main character, Mina. Mina was a hard character for me to like. She was selfish and self-centered. If you read the blurb it’s easy to understand why she has these traits with her reclusive life. But, being inside of her mind was fairly boring. The second POV was Andrea, the kidnapped young girl and the third was the serial killer.
For me, the first 40% of this story was slow and boring. It didn’t help that I didn’t like Mina. The POV’s of the other characters were used sparingly and gave little bits of information but not enough to clue me in on the whole story. There comes a point in this story where Mina and the serial killer go head to head, and my actual,real-life reaction was WTF and that was my feelings throughout the remainder of the story. This story completely went off the rails of any expectations I may have developed up to that point. Seriously off the rails.
Though Mina comes across as weak, she has quite the history that shows appearances are quite deceiving. And everything that takes place with the serial killer is just a reminder that it’s the quiet ones you need to look out for. Honestly, the second half of this book had me by its grip and I could not finish it quick enough. And once I finished I couldn’t believe what I just read! This is a dark, twisty story that will keep you surprised and guessing throughout. And if you’re not taken by surprise by the crazy actions of Mina in this story, that tells me everything I need to know about you…and we should be friends, lol. 😉
Honestly, if you like the unexpected, dark and twisty reads you should definitely read this! And, if it matters to you, there’s even a little romance included in this book. And I guess a HEA is implied but knowing what I do about Mina, I have suspicions.
Rating: 4 Stars
This was a quick and entertaining read, but I felt as though it was predictable and there were areas that the content dragged and seemed superfluous.