Will Trent: Books 2-4

A Karin Slaughter Thriller Collection Featuring Fractured, Undone, and Broken

By: Karin Slaughter

Narrated by: Kathleen Early

WATCH WILL TRENT ON ABC!

A Karin Slaughter Will Trent thriller collection featuring Fractured, Undone, and Broken

©2024 Karin Slaughter (P)2024 HarperCollins Publishers

Good story and great value

I listened to this collection after listening to the first Will Trent book. Slaughter’s storylines are interesting and keep you hooked. I’ve enjoyed the storylines as I find they’re well written and realistic and I’m never able to figure out who ‘dun it before the end of the story. I give the collection four stars for the performance due to the fact I thought the narrator for the first will Trent novel was a better choice. But that would not keep me from listening again or recommending this collection to someone. 

Enjoyed

Wonderful story about Will Trent it was great well done and put together and it kept me going through out the story

I enjoyed everything

everything healing with allowed timing to summit the hole and filling in missing people.

Sure keeps your interest

I love Will Trent! Such a great series. The narrator is top notch. I could listen to her again and again!!

Never a dull moment

These are worth the credit. I love all of the books. Trent is good at his job.

Characterization

Excellent job with characters and plot. I am definitely a Will Trent and Sarah Linton fan.

Gripping all the way through

Each book was a great read / listen and helped build upon the foundation of this series. Definitely would do it again.

Dark Police Suspense

This omnibus edition is definitely worth its price and the time to read it. Individual reviews of its constituent volumes follow:

Book 2, Fractured:

4 stars

While the first book in this series had some structural choices that made the story a bit difficult to follow, this book worked much better for me.

There is a clear investigative throughline holding the story together, and that plot is quite compelling.

But the core of this book is the characters. There are two leads: Will Trent, an investigator with the Georgia Bureau of Investigation, who grew up in orphanages and foster care and who struggles with dyslexia. And Faith Mitchell, an Atlanta PD detective and the daughter of a senior APD officer who will had implicated in a corruption case previously.

The interplay between the characters is a major part of the attraction of this book, with Trent attempting to hide his issues and Mitchell suspicious that Trent is just using her for scutwork and not trusting her abilities.

This relationship is developed as the two are investigating a complex murder and abduction case involving a character from Trent's time in the foster care system. The supporting characters are likewise complex and believable, and the results of the crimes are treated unflinchingly, with convincing effects on those affected.

This is a very dark book, and I wouldn't recommend it for any reader with significant problems with triggering descriptions. But it's compelling and well-written enough that i would recommend it for other audiences.


Book 3, Undone

3 stars

Do not look for happy endings here; this is a tremendously dark and depressing novel.

The character work is stellar. Slaughter can write people with serious problems in their lives as well as anyone. And none of the characters experiences miraculous healing and solves his or her problems by the last page of the book, even though they are sympathetic enough that you really want the protagonists to get their lives together. The main antagonist is believably horrific, and his supporting cast is believable in a very sad way.

The plot stretches credulity, but only in the way that any serial killer novel does. Within the standards of the genre, this is entirely believable.

All of which would argue for a high rating. But this book, compelling as it is, is too depressing for that. I'm sure that there is an audience for this kind of relentlessly grim writing, and it's possible that I will be that audience in the future, but I'm going to have to take some time before I come back to this series.

Book 4, Broken

4 stars

While this is a Will Trent novel, it focuses more on Sara Linton, a doctor and incipient love interest of Will's. Sara was also one of the stars of Slaughter's previous "Grant County" series.

The story is set in Sara's old home town and involves several suspicious deaths, jan old nemesis of hers, and several of her old friends. The investigation progresses by fits and starts, implicating first one suspect then another. The mystery is believable and the twists work well.

There is also a secondary plot of Will's growing relationship with Sara and its conflict with his strange marriage to Angie, a former police officer and a former resident in the same orphanage that Will grew up in. The marriage is as dysfunctional as any I've seen in fiction, and Slaughter brings Angie back into Will's life at only the most inconvenient times.

The character development here is very good. Will's history and disability are both explored further and Sara's background drives much of the action in the story.

Recommended.

books are good

only complaint is that they switched narratives. shes is good but she is no Michael Kramer.

intriguing crime mystery trilogy

if you enjoy crime mysteries, Will trent is the investigator for you. The author develops the characters well and write the story to make sense. You may not guess who's "done it", but once revealed, it's an "ah ha" moment.