Author Natalie Hanson has embarked on a new series for her readers and Book One of the Zalla Bennbett mysteries is out – featuring a not-so-perfect loner in the FBI Special Agent’s protagonist role. Hanson plunges the reader of The Unknown Man into an intriguing kidnapping with the lives of twin sisters hanging in the balance.

Bennbett prefers to work alone, but when transplanted from the home office she finds herself paired with Dallon Brown, an inexperienced, approval-seeking local Deputy Sherriff bent on making her investigation as challenging as actually finding leads.

Fortunately, at the cost of alienating her superiors (and her husband), Bennbett does have a gift from the universe, a peculiar and powerful ability to detect lies. Now if she could only use her talents to establish a tiny trail of clues left behind she can save the girls.

Power and Pace

As detective stories go, the Zalla Bennbett mysteries starts off with a bang. there’s plenty to keep us reading and while she and her husband are at serious loggerheads, the case actually brings them together, although not in a way they ever expected.

There’s a nice power running through Bennbett’s veins, and while insecure about her own place in the universe and her looks, she moves proficiently at times and the pace of the story improves as the novel develops. Some characters are also deliberately annoying, weird and scary. At the same time, the antagonist moves in their own word – one that is sickly sadistic. Be prepared!

You’ll find this book for just $2.99 and Free to Kindle Unlimited users at Amazon. It runs 213 pages, a quick but satisfying read.