With a smart, beautiful woman overly dedicated to her work and a broken FBI agent working to find a killer as main characters, Golden Heart and RITA award winner Dodd's latest novel hits just about every cliché in the romantic thriller genre. But it doesn't matter because the characters are flawed, three-dimensional, and compelling. And an earthquake and subsequent tsunami in the coastal town of Virtue Falls is an unusual and tumultuous setting for a quickly ratcheting spiral of tension that fragments into murder. Elizabeth Banner is well known, but not for her brilliance in geology. Instead, she's recognized as the child who witnessed her father kill her mother. Her ex-husband, Garik Jacobsen, suspects that Charles Banner may be innocent of the crime for which he was convicted and that the killer is still at large. VERDICT A few secondary story lines seem extraneous and there is some occasionally overwrought dialog, but the red herrings galore and multiple third-person points of view will keep readers guessing whodunit right up to the end. For romantic suspense fans and those who enjoy tautly plotted page-turners. [See Prepub Alert, 3/17/14; 100,000-copy first printing.]—Charli Osborne, Oxford P.L., MI

In the predictable first of a new suspense series, bestseller Dodd (Lady in Black) tracks West Coast turmoil of all sorts. For starters, a serial killer who delights in murdering young women and mutilating their children is loose in California. Meanwhile, an earthquake hits the town of Virtue Falls, Wash., with an attendant tsunami and aftershocks. The geologist on the scene, Elizabeth Banner, has crime in her background. Her father was put away decades ago for fatally stabbing her mother, Misty, with a pair of scissors. But did he? Papa Banner has always maintained his innocence, and odd similarities between Misty's death and the serial killer's m.o. raise the terrifying possibility that the Banner killer might still be at large. Steamy romance between Elizabeth and her ex, as well as charming minor characters, such as an amiable retired physician, help alleviate the tedium of this novel, whose conclusion one can see hundreds of pages before the end. 100,000 first printing. Agent: Mel Berger, William Morris Endeavor. (Sept.)

In the predictable first of a new suspense series, bestseller Dodd (Lady in Black) tracks West Coast turmoil of all sorts. For starters, a serial killer who delights in murdering young women and mutilating their children is loose in California. Meanwhile, an earthquake hits the town of Virtue Falls, Wash., with an attendant tsunami and aftershocks. The geologist on the scene, Elizabeth Banner, has crime in her background. Her father was put away decades ago for fatally stabbing her mother, Misty, with a pair of scissors. But did he? Papa Banner has always maintained his innocence, and odd similarities between Misty's death and the serial killer's m.o. raise the terrifying possibility that the Banner killer might still be at large. Steamy romance between Elizabeth and her ex, as well as charming minor characters, such as an amiable retired physician, help alleviate the tedium of this novel, whose conclusion one can see hundreds of pages before the end. 100,000 first printing. Agent: Mel Berger, William Morris Endeavor. (Sept.)