Expecting to Die

January 9, 2017
Bestseller Jackson’s overly busy seventh Selena Alvarez/Regan Pescoli novel (after 2014’s Deserves to Die) finds the Grizzly Falls, Mont., detectives dealing with bigfoot sightings, teenagers with too many secrets, and a murder. Around midnight one night, Pescoli’s daughter, Bianca, joins a large group of fellow teens who are playing a clandestine game of hide-and-seek in the forest, where, to her horror, Bianca spots an immense, hairy monster. When the beast comes after her, Bianca runs. After falling into a creek, she stumbles on a decomposing body. A few hours later, early in the morning, Pescoli, who thought her daughter was spending the night with a friend, receives a phone call from a police officer she knows, who suggests she come to the old lumber camp where a shaken Bianca and the other game players who haven’t already fled the scene have gathered. Alvarez later identifies the body as that of Destiny Rose Montclaire, a missing teenager. More deaths follow as Jackson’s plot spins in too many different directions to achieve much suspense. Agent: Robin Rue, Writers House.