For more than thirteen years, Special Agent Winter Black has believed her little brother was dead—kidnapped and murdered by The Preacher, the same lunatic who killed her parents. A lead into Justin’s whereabouts brings her out of her hiatus to chase it, but other cases need her attention too.

At the FBI, tensions are high when a body is dug up, encased in a fifty-five-gallon drum. The team soon realizes they aren’t hunting the typical serial killer, but a skilled surgeon. One who experiments on atypical brains—brains just like her new friend’s; brains just like her own—then disposes of their patients like they would a defective organ.

In the mix, Winter’s childhood psychiatrist surfaces—the only medical professional who knows about her abilities, or so she thinks.

Could the murders be connected?

Time is running out, because now, the killer is after Winter’s friend. And after her.

I have mentioned before that this is a mammoth series to start reading and the first three books in this series have been stellar reads for me. That streak however, is now broken!

Montages in films, we know, are all there to pass time and be the filler for a preexisting gap. We come to expect these when watching films. A filler book, however, is everything a reader detests folded into 300-ish pages.

This book was a filler, and it wasn’t even a very good filler. I felt like I was watching ‘A Chorus Line’ as a book. Famously, I don’t get on well with the musical ‘A Chorus Line’ because the plot stops in the middle and then – TA DA – the end.

This was like that. I thought the plot would be centred around Winter’s brother Justin and it started out that way. But then it deviated to a murdered body and a very lukewarm plot into a suspicious person who’s linked to both Winter and Autumn.

It honestly didn’t make a lot of sense. We were introduced to a mysterious hierarchy that may or may not exist and for the most part, didn’t hold much logic in terms of the plot.

I felt like I was floating down a lazy river with no stopping point. It was bland. It was beige. It was unremarkable. It was unrememberable.

I was disappointed.

I can see that the author is setting Autumn and Aiden up to either be partners in crime or love interests and while I can see their personalities match enough for them to make either of those relationships work, Aiden still creeps me out as a character whose redeeming qualities I have yet to see.

If I stick in the positivity camp, I can see small tendrils of change between Winter and Noah. You all know I’m holding out on that pairing, but I haven’t yet seen anything to confirm or deny where that relationship is heading.

I can only assume this is an interlude to book 5, it’s the only reason that makes sense to me right now.

I give this book: ⭐⭐⭐