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Shattered (Wheeler Hardcover) by Karen Robards
Secrets, betrayal, and a mysterious family history plague the heroine in the latest novel from New York Times-bestselling author Karen Robards. The past is never over. It just gets dusty. Lisa Shewmaker was a rising star in a prestigious law firm in Lexington, Kentucky; that is, until the firm went bankrupt and she lost her job. With an ailing mother to care for, Lisa takes the first position she can research assistant to District Attorney Scott Buchanan. Scott is as disagreeable as he is sexy, and Lisa suspects the only reason she got the job is because of her privileged upbringing as the daughter of a wealthy federal judge. While reviewing cold cases in the Fayette County courthouse, a particularly thick manila envelope draws Lisa's attention. The details of the case are An entire family—father, mother, and two children—disappeared more than twenty-eight years ago. Except that's not The mother in the photo could have been Lisa's twin, and the toddler in the picture bears an uncanny resemblance to Lisa herself. Before Lisa can learn more about her past, a series of catastrophes strike close to home. Lisa confides in Scott, and their relationship develops into something completely different. Together Lisa and Scott unravel a terrifying web of criminal connections that could destroy the very fabric of Lisa's life—if she lives long enough, that is.
Hardcover
First published March 23, 2010
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About the author
Karen Robards
135 books3,240 followersKaren Robards is the New York Times, USA Today, and Publishers Weekly bestselling author of more than fifty books and one novella. She has won multiple awards including six Affaire de Coeur Silver Pen Awards for favorite author.
Karen has been writing since she was very young, and was first published nationally in the December 1973 Reader's Digest. She sold her first romance novel, ISLAND FLAME, when she was 24. It was published by Leisure Books in 1981 and is still in print. After that, she dropped out of law school to pursue her writing career.
Karen was recently described by The Daily Mail as "one of the most reliable thriller....writers in the world."
Karen has been writing since she was very young, and was first published nationally in the December 1973 Reader's Digest. She sold her first romance novel, ISLAND FLAME, when she was 24. It was published by Leisure Books in 1981 and is still in print. After that, she dropped out of law school to pursue her writing career.
Karen was recently described by The Daily Mail as "one of the most reliable thriller....writers in the world."
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 489 reviews
October 16, 2017
4.25/5
I must admit, I was pretty hesitant to pick up Shattered considering the author's other books I've read have been a bit hit or miss. Therefore, I didn't expect much from this one, but to my surprise, it kept me entertained from start to finish. I enjoyed both main characters, especially Scott. Yeah, love me some brooding yet caring and protective heroes!
The romance between Scott and Lisa was great. I liked it. The push and pull that took up almost half of the book made perfect sense to me and I really enjoyed it. Oh, you didn’t read it wrong… I enjoyed the push and pull of the romance in this book! Well, as you know, this thing normally annoys the hell out of me. But for some inexplicable reason, I loved the fact that they had known each other since they were young and the forging of such an affectionate bond between them was far more intense than they themselves had ever realized. Furthermore, I loved the unmistakable sexual tension between these two immensely.
The suspense part was well-written and well-placed. The author got me so caught up in the mysteries that seriously needed to be solved and I found myself flipping the pages madly until the end.
Then why not 5 stars?
**Mild spoilers ahead!
I have to say that I was a little upset with the conclusion of the story and it was like the bad guy kind of came out of nowhere. When the killer was ultimately revealed, I didn't know what to think of this man because I couldn't remember who he was! I had to flip back several pages in order to see what I missed and that wasn’t fun at all. Moreover, I wasn’t satisfied with how Lisa was rescued. It wasn’t what I expected.
I don't know. It just wasn't an impressive ending, at least for me.
However, as I already mentioned, this was a very engaging and compelling read. I really did enjoy it. And most of all, the hero's character simply ticked my right boxes.
Recommended if you are fans of romantic suspense.
I must admit, I was pretty hesitant to pick up Shattered considering the author's other books I've read have been a bit hit or miss. Therefore, I didn't expect much from this one, but to my surprise, it kept me entertained from start to finish. I enjoyed both main characters, especially Scott. Yeah, love me some brooding yet caring and protective heroes!
The romance between Scott and Lisa was great. I liked it. The push and pull that took up almost half of the book made perfect sense to me and I really enjoyed it. Oh, you didn’t read it wrong… I enjoyed the push and pull of the romance in this book! Well, as you know, this thing normally annoys the hell out of me. But for some inexplicable reason, I loved the fact that they had known each other since they were young and the forging of such an affectionate bond between them was far more intense than they themselves had ever realized. Furthermore, I loved the unmistakable sexual tension between these two immensely.
The suspense part was well-written and well-placed. The author got me so caught up in the mysteries that seriously needed to be solved and I found myself flipping the pages madly until the end.
Then why not 5 stars?
**Mild spoilers ahead!
I have to say that I was a little upset with the conclusion of the story and it was like the bad guy kind of came out of nowhere. When the killer was ultimately revealed, I didn't know what to think of this man because I couldn't remember who he was! I had to flip back several pages in order to see what I missed and that wasn’t fun at all. Moreover, I wasn’t satisfied with how Lisa was rescued. It wasn’t what I expected.
I don't know. It just wasn't an impressive ending, at least for me.
However, as I already mentioned, this was a very engaging and compelling read. I really did enjoy it. And most of all, the hero's character simply ticked my right boxes.
Recommended if you are fans of romantic suspense.
February 3, 2021
Yum.
I haven’t been a big fan of Ms. Robards so far, but I may have done her a disservice. The author provided a dual POV which gave this RS an interesting spin.
I found DA Scott Buchanan a good yin to Lisa Grant’s yang. They had a history since they were teenagers. He was from the wrong side of the tracks while he referred to her as ‘Princess’ because of her lifestyle.
Now he is her boss and someone is out to harm her. Sparks fly and there is a good bit of tension that simmers below the surface. Shattered reminded me of Linda Howard’s or Sandra Brown’s better romantic suspense novels with a dominant male and a spirited female.
I appreciated Lisa’s loyalty to her mother; she had a debilitating disease and she was there for her. I really liked Scott’s kindness toward Mrs. Grant. She was a fixture from his childhood who supplied good memories that followed him into adulthood. Believe me, he needed them.
Be sure and read the prologue because, truthfully, SHATTERED centers around a situation from the past. And honestly, there were enough moments I had to wonder how Lisa was going to survive, but Scott was her knight in shining armor.
As I said, yum!
I haven’t been a big fan of Ms. Robards so far, but I may have done her a disservice. The author provided a dual POV which gave this RS an interesting spin.
I found DA Scott Buchanan a good yin to Lisa Grant’s yang. They had a history since they were teenagers. He was from the wrong side of the tracks while he referred to her as ‘Princess’ because of her lifestyle.
Now he is her boss and someone is out to harm her. Sparks fly and there is a good bit of tension that simmers below the surface. Shattered reminded me of Linda Howard’s or Sandra Brown’s better romantic suspense novels with a dominant male and a spirited female.
I appreciated Lisa’s loyalty to her mother; she had a debilitating disease and she was there for her. I really liked Scott’s kindness toward Mrs. Grant. She was a fixture from his childhood who supplied good memories that followed him into adulthood. Believe me, he needed them.
Be sure and read the prologue because, truthfully, SHATTERED centers around a situation from the past. And honestly, there were enough moments I had to wonder how Lisa was going to survive, but Scott was her knight in shining armor.
As I said, yum!
July 23, 2020
This was an intriguing read with insane chemistry between hero/heroine. Also a good murder/disappearance mystery to solve. Recommended to fans of mystery suspense thrillers.
April 7, 2010
3.75 stars for me ***Major spoilers in this review***
Like many authors, Karen Robards has gone from historical romance to writing romantic suspense. (although she does still write some historicals) She's had some hit and misses with her RS books. I've enjoyed the last couple she's put out and have to add this one to that list.
In some of her previous RS books I felt the romance was not as important as the mystery. It was almost the opposite in this book, which I enjoyed.
Our H/h, Scott and Lisa, have known each other since they were younger, which I think helped make the romance stronger in this book. I enjoyed the antagonism between the two and the jealousy the two experienced with each other. Once the physical relationship started b/t the two it wasn't long before the "l" word made its appearance. It worked with this book because they knew each other from childhood and the attraction was always there. As the reader, I could always see something between Scott and Lisa.
I just had a few problems with this read. One, it was a bit slow to start. Two, the true villian of the story was already dead and didn't get punishment for his actions (which were truly vile IMO) and for starting all of the events in motion. However, the actual killer was still alive and received punishment. My final problem with this book was the abrupt ending. Robards is famous for this in her RS books. The "whodunit" and "why it was done" were all cleared up very well. What I didn't like was we didn't get to see her first meet with her sister of whom she had no knowledge. We just got a last line referring to the sister's eye color (which referenced a clue earlier in the book).
I'm a sucker for family reunions, long lost sibs and families reunited. Show me the reunion!
All in all this was a good read. I probably wouldn't read it again and it won't go on a keeper shelf but it was still enjoyable.
Like many authors, Karen Robards has gone from historical romance to writing romantic suspense. (although she does still write some historicals) She's had some hit and misses with her RS books. I've enjoyed the last couple she's put out and have to add this one to that list.
In some of her previous RS books I felt the romance was not as important as the mystery. It was almost the opposite in this book, which I enjoyed.
Our H/h, Scott and Lisa, have known each other since they were younger, which I think helped make the romance stronger in this book. I enjoyed the antagonism between the two and the jealousy the two experienced with each other. Once the physical relationship started b/t the two it wasn't long before the "l" word made its appearance. It worked with this book because they knew each other from childhood and the attraction was always there. As the reader, I could always see something between Scott and Lisa.
I just had a few problems with this read. One, it was a bit slow to start. Two, the true villian of the story was already dead and didn't get punishment for his actions (which were truly vile IMO) and for starting all of the events in motion. However, the actual killer was still alive and received punishment. My final problem with this book was the abrupt ending. Robards is famous for this in her RS books. The "whodunit" and "why it was done" were all cleared up very well. What I didn't like was we didn't get to see her first meet with her sister of whom she had no knowledge. We just got a last line referring to the sister's eye color (which referenced a clue earlier in the book).
I'm a sucker for family reunions, long lost sibs and families reunited. Show me the reunion!
All in all this was a good read. I probably wouldn't read it again and it won't go on a keeper shelf but it was still enjoyable.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
August 12, 2010
This was an easy book that rolled along for me as at a good pace. My only complaint is that it was too much "bodice ripper" and not enough mystery. I listened to this book on CD in my car and it took me more time than had I read it. This is the kind of book I enjoy while riding in the car, a light, easy to follow romantic thriller. The mystery was intriging even though I instantly knew how the story was going to evolve.
While researching some cold case files, Lisa Grant, assistant reviewer to D.A. Scott Buchanan, comes across an unsolved crime where a whole family, the Garcias, disappeared suddenly. After examining the evidence Lisa realizes eerily that she looks exactly like the young girl in the family. As the story goes on more and more clues just don't add up and even though she inquires of her mother who is terminally ill, her mother assures her that she wasn't adopted and has the hospital birth pictures to prove it. Confused, Lisa searches on for the answer to her familiarity to the cold case. Meanwhile, it comes out that Scott, her boss, who has always had a crush on Lisa and she on him since their teenage years. Even though Scott has made a promise never to give his complete heart to any woman they find themselves not only attracted to each but "doing the nasty a lot." In between heavy bouts of sexual situations they solve the mystery together. Pheeeew, I was tired when I got to the end. All in all this was, while not the greatest book, it was an enjoyable fluffy mystery.
While researching some cold case files, Lisa Grant, assistant reviewer to D.A. Scott Buchanan, comes across an unsolved crime where a whole family, the Garcias, disappeared suddenly. After examining the evidence Lisa realizes eerily that she looks exactly like the young girl in the family. As the story goes on more and more clues just don't add up and even though she inquires of her mother who is terminally ill, her mother assures her that she wasn't adopted and has the hospital birth pictures to prove it. Confused, Lisa searches on for the answer to her familiarity to the cold case. Meanwhile, it comes out that Scott, her boss, who has always had a crush on Lisa and she on him since their teenage years. Even though Scott has made a promise never to give his complete heart to any woman they find themselves not only attracted to each but "doing the nasty a lot." In between heavy bouts of sexual situations they solve the mystery together. Pheeeew, I was tired when I got to the end. All in all this was, while not the greatest book, it was an enjoyable fluffy mystery.
June 7, 2010
Rating: 2.5 / 5
I've been reading Karen Robards since not long after I started reading romance. She has some really great romantic suspense books, but unfortunately, her last few books have been subpar, in my opinion. And honestly, I considered this book her last chance at keeping me reading her new releases. Did she win me back? Probably not.
Summary:
After lawyer Lisa Grant loses her job when the firm she works for goes belly-up, she decides to return to her hometown of Lexington, Kentucky and help take car of her mother, who is in the last stages of ALS. Lisa takes a job as a researcher for DA Scott Buchanan. She and Scott have known each other for years, ever since he was the trashy son of a drunk who worked on her parents farm. Now he's a stud lawyer...with a grumbly attitude.
Lisa gets on his bad side and gets banished to look through old cold cases. Which is where she discovers the Garcia file - a young family disappears without a trace during the 1980's. But what's strange is that Lisa looks almost exactly like the mother in the photo. Lisa can't let it go and looks into the case. Bad things start to happen...a fire, an assault, a car accident. And through it, Scott becomes someone Lisa can lean on as she searches for the truth.
Review:
I was really hoping this book would be more like Robards's older romantic suspenses with a dynamic suspense plot and a great romance. It wasn't, unfortunately. I won't say that the book was bad in anyway. I didn't hate it, didn't have much trouble reading it. But it wasn't all that good either, didn't engage me anywhere near like what her older books did. Disappointing.
The suspense plot in the book is rather low intensity. It seems like it's going to be a really great story...missing family from years ago, a woman who looks like them, and other bits and pieces. I had high hopes it would be a great plot. But it never really pulled itself together. The story meanders at a near crawling pace that never really seems to get anywhere.
As the book starts, you get the basic situation and you expect a lot of investigating, fact-finding, discovery...all of it helping to put a puzzle together. But really, as the book moves on, you get very few facts added in. A doll, some near death situations, a couple other little tidbits, and that's it. Then all the sudden you get to the end and get blasted with pages and pages of narrative and dialogue explaining all that had happened. I mean, literally, it's a character sitting there and explaining like 20 years of events for five pages. Some of the explanation seemed to come out of nowhere, with no prior info leading up to it. Which altogether showed me a distinct lack of development throughout the book if that much had to be explained at the end. Plus, there aren't really any good clues to the bad guys' identity. That was annoying.
Also, maybe it's just me, but something seemed off about the fact that you have Lisa, a rising star lawyer at a good Boston law firm getting stuck working a job as a researcher. I mean, come on, are you really telling me that no where in the Lexington area she couldn't find work as a lawyer?
On the romance front...eh, it was okay. Very, very very slow building. For the first 250 pages of the book (its 388 pages long), Lisa is dating someone else, and Lisa and Scott just admire each other from a distance. Kinda dull. Then suddenly they fall into bed and then are practically glued to each others sides. I liked these two characters, and the romance had a sweet edge to it as the book progressed, but something was missing. I didn't feel very connected to these characters.
Another thing I found rather annoying was how the author would randomly toss out ten-dollar words in spots that seemed ill-fitting. Some of the words I didn't even know the meanings of. I consider myself to have a decent vocabulary and when I'm reading fiction for fun, I don't want to have to drag out a dictionary.
That wasn't the only writing issue, either. All throughout the book, there are these sentences that go on and on and on. There'd be sentences with multiple commas, hyphens, parentheses and all this info coming at you so that by the end of the sentence you'd completely forget the initial point. I'd have to stop, reread the first clause of the sentence, then read the rest slowly to get what the author was trying to say. Which, needless to say, is ridiculously annoying and distracting. There were also these long chunks of narrative that didn't help either. I wanted action and dialogue and more often than not got these massive page-long paragraphs of pointless narrative. There'd be like two pages of narrative describing a room. So boring.
So what's the bottomline on this book? It's not bad, really. I think there are plenty of people who would read it and like it. It just didn't do it for me. I think I'll probably end up passing on whatever Robards's next new book might be. I'll still read the few backlist books of hers I have waiting, but the new stuff...probably not.
I've been reading Karen Robards since not long after I started reading romance. She has some really great romantic suspense books, but unfortunately, her last few books have been subpar, in my opinion. And honestly, I considered this book her last chance at keeping me reading her new releases. Did she win me back? Probably not.
Summary:
After lawyer Lisa Grant loses her job when the firm she works for goes belly-up, she decides to return to her hometown of Lexington, Kentucky and help take car of her mother, who is in the last stages of ALS. Lisa takes a job as a researcher for DA Scott Buchanan. She and Scott have known each other for years, ever since he was the trashy son of a drunk who worked on her parents farm. Now he's a stud lawyer...with a grumbly attitude.
Lisa gets on his bad side and gets banished to look through old cold cases. Which is where she discovers the Garcia file - a young family disappears without a trace during the 1980's. But what's strange is that Lisa looks almost exactly like the mother in the photo. Lisa can't let it go and looks into the case. Bad things start to happen...a fire, an assault, a car accident. And through it, Scott becomes someone Lisa can lean on as she searches for the truth.
Review:
I was really hoping this book would be more like Robards's older romantic suspenses with a dynamic suspense plot and a great romance. It wasn't, unfortunately. I won't say that the book was bad in anyway. I didn't hate it, didn't have much trouble reading it. But it wasn't all that good either, didn't engage me anywhere near like what her older books did. Disappointing.
The suspense plot in the book is rather low intensity. It seems like it's going to be a really great story...missing family from years ago, a woman who looks like them, and other bits and pieces. I had high hopes it would be a great plot. But it never really pulled itself together. The story meanders at a near crawling pace that never really seems to get anywhere.
As the book starts, you get the basic situation and you expect a lot of investigating, fact-finding, discovery...all of it helping to put a puzzle together. But really, as the book moves on, you get very few facts added in. A doll, some near death situations, a couple other little tidbits, and that's it. Then all the sudden you get to the end and get blasted with pages and pages of narrative and dialogue explaining all that had happened. I mean, literally, it's a character sitting there and explaining like 20 years of events for five pages. Some of the explanation seemed to come out of nowhere, with no prior info leading up to it. Which altogether showed me a distinct lack of development throughout the book if that much had to be explained at the end. Plus, there aren't really any good clues to the bad guys' identity. That was annoying.
Also, maybe it's just me, but something seemed off about the fact that you have Lisa, a rising star lawyer at a good Boston law firm getting stuck working a job as a researcher. I mean, come on, are you really telling me that no where in the Lexington area she couldn't find work as a lawyer?
On the romance front...eh, it was okay. Very, very very slow building. For the first 250 pages of the book (its 388 pages long), Lisa is dating someone else, and Lisa and Scott just admire each other from a distance. Kinda dull. Then suddenly they fall into bed and then are practically glued to each others sides. I liked these two characters, and the romance had a sweet edge to it as the book progressed, but something was missing. I didn't feel very connected to these characters.
Another thing I found rather annoying was how the author would randomly toss out ten-dollar words in spots that seemed ill-fitting. Some of the words I didn't even know the meanings of. I consider myself to have a decent vocabulary and when I'm reading fiction for fun, I don't want to have to drag out a dictionary.
That wasn't the only writing issue, either. All throughout the book, there are these sentences that go on and on and on. There'd be sentences with multiple commas, hyphens, parentheses and all this info coming at you so that by the end of the sentence you'd completely forget the initial point. I'd have to stop, reread the first clause of the sentence, then read the rest slowly to get what the author was trying to say. Which, needless to say, is ridiculously annoying and distracting. There were also these long chunks of narrative that didn't help either. I wanted action and dialogue and more often than not got these massive page-long paragraphs of pointless narrative. There'd be like two pages of narrative describing a room. So boring.
So what's the bottomline on this book? It's not bad, really. I think there are plenty of people who would read it and like it. It just didn't do it for me. I think I'll probably end up passing on whatever Robards's next new book might be. I'll still read the few backlist books of hers I have waiting, but the new stuff...probably not.
November 19, 2019
Lisa Grant is working as a research assistant for District Attorney Scott Buchanan when she comes across a cold case where a family had vanished over 28 years ago, with the mother bearing a strong resemblence to herself. I found this book very predictable, drawn out and slow. Very heavy on the romance and light on the mystery.
June 2, 2019
Shattered was quite good!
The mystery was top notch - I had just a vague a idea of what's going on - and didn't figure out the villains and their motives until they were unmasked. The romance was scorching - one of those where the leads have had the hots for each other for years - and there was an incredible chemistry between them. They knew each other really well and were a very well matched couple, who gave as good as they got. My only complaint is that once they got together, the romance became really secondary - in fact, Scott, became somewhat secondary - we barely saw him dealing with his own issues (namely his family) again. Oh, and how many times can somebody get knocked in the head without having head trauma?
The narration by Ericksen was ok. Her male voices were really sub-par, which is a shame because Scott seemed too hot for words. This would have been scorching with a good male narrator.
This is my first book by Robards so I'll be sure to check her backlist!
The mystery was top notch - I had just a vague a idea of what's going on - and didn't figure out the villains and their motives until they were unmasked. The romance was scorching - one of those where the leads have had the hots for each other for years - and there was an incredible chemistry between them. They knew each other really well and were a very well matched couple, who gave as good as they got. My only complaint is that once they got together, the romance became really secondary - in fact, Scott, became somewhat secondary - we barely saw him dealing with his own issues (namely his family) again. Oh, and how many times can somebody get knocked in the head without having head trauma?
The narration by Ericksen was ok. Her male voices were really sub-par, which is a shame because Scott seemed too hot for words. This would have been scorching with a good male narrator.
This is my first book by Robards so I'll be sure to check her backlist!
November 20, 2020
In realtà 4,5⭐️
January 9, 2011
I've read quite a few books by Karen Robards, but I'd have to say 'Shattered' didn't top the charts for me. I find Robards a very descriptive writer, and while I like authors to set the scene, I find it very cumbersome to read descriptions that last over a page, and describes something that in the end adds no value to how the story plays out. 'Shattered' in my opinion falls victim to descriptive filler. Many times during the course of reading this story I found myself skimming over the page just looking for dialogue between the characters. The one redeeming quality about 'Shattered' was the fact that by the end I still had no idea who the villain was.
October 27, 2011
A very good romantic suspense novel. Very seductive and a page turner until the very end. I couldn't put it down!
April 29, 2010
When Lisa Grant moves back home to care for her mother, she must take a job as research assistant to the local district attorney, even though she has been a lawyer for a number of years. The DA just happens to be a Scott Buchanan whom she's known since they were both children. Although she finds him annoying, she is strongly attracted to him. While performing research, Lisa discovers a cold case file that has a photo in it of a young woman who looks exactly like her. As she starts investigating, lethal accidents start happening to her and she realizes that someone will kill to keep the details of this case secret. With the help of Scott and others in the DA's office she tries to solve the case before before she is killed.
This was a very suspenseful book and the identity of the killer was totally unexpected.
This was a very suspenseful book and the identity of the killer was totally unexpected.
July 19, 2011
What a horrible book. Boring premise, ridiculous ending with stupid, childish characters. Hard to believe the main character is a lawyer. Everything was so forced. Lisa gets a cold-case file, sees the dead woman looks exactly like her and right away she thinks she's adopted; that her estranged father is behind it.There's an accident at her house within the first few chapters and again she's wondering if it happened because of the file. Are you kidding me? By the way, where was the editor? The name is Lisa, not Beth which she is referred to at one point. Hello??? Anybody home?? An awful book I certainly would never recommend.
August 5, 2012
Fairly good plot driven narrative with character growth in the form of 'falling in love' and being able to 'solve the mystery.' Robards is able to entice the reader to become involved in the story line with a very intriguing mystery set out in the prologue. The characters are likable albeit predictable. Robards offers some plausible sidelines for the solving of the disappearance of the Garcia family and Lisa Grant's true identity, but there is no huge surprise at the end. The ending is however, satisfying. True escapist reading.
March 25, 2012
Perfetta miscela di suspense e romance, con personaggi ben delineati e una trama sapientemente sviluppata. La Robards è molto brava a descrivere lo stato d'animo dei protagonisti, lo scorrere della vita quotidiana nella quale, improvvisamente, un imprevisto cambia tutto. Il romanzo tiene incollati fino all'ultima pagina, in uno stile scorrevole e coinvolgente.
July 16, 2017
Lisa Grant is banished to the cold case files when she is late for work, and while scanning the old cases into a new system, discovers one of the files contains a photo of a family with a mother who is a dead ringer for her. Thirty years ago, the family disappeared without a trace. Could there be a link to her own family? It would certainly seem so - she takes the file home with her and that night, the house is set alight! The plot then gets thrown away for most of the book as Lisa grapples with her feelings for Scott Buchanan, a lawyer, and her boss. She's had a thing for him since childhood, and vice versa, but he's vowed not to get involved with an employee.
Two stars is being very generous! It only achieves this, I think, by being slightly better than some of the stinkers I've recently read by the likes of Sandra Brown and Linda Howard, who write in the same genre. Otherwise, it's quite terrible! Zero plot, totally predictable and I hated the main characters!
Oh, yes, I should mention that Lisa is already dating Joel Peyton, another guy from her childhood. Although it's Scott who her loins burn for, she's so intent on resisting those feelings, she seems to think it's fine to string Joel along until she makes up her mind, even though she's pretty much fully aware that he does nothing for her, despite making out with him plenty of times. Gross! What utterly odious behaviour! And Scott is no better. Jealous that Lisa won't dump Joel, even though Scott's the one saying that he and Lisa can't date, Scott agrees to go on a date with Lisa's best friend, Nola. For real! He also likes to call her - at work - sexist terms such as "Princess" and "Baby", and refer to Joel as "Loverboy", which you would think would be very convincing grounds for a sexual harassment suit, but maybe Scott simply isn't a very good lawyer. Who know?
These two were awful. Disgusting! Even though she's 28 and he's 32, they're both acting like they're 12. They deserved each other and I didn't really care what happened to either of them! I liked Nola, who thankfully wasn't slut-shamed for her actions, and Joel turned out to be pretty decent, too. I would have much preferred a book featuring the two of them!
I kept reading to see if my prediction about the killer was right, and I was. The book is so lazy that it doesn't even return to the plot until the last 100 or so pages. It's all very predictable, and the climax is utterly pathetic. It kept me relatively involved, I'll give it that, and there were a couple of okay suspense sequences, but the stomach-churning, juvenile antics of the putrid protagonists really knocked most of the enjoyment out of this one.
Two stars is being very generous! It only achieves this, I think, by being slightly better than some of the stinkers I've recently read by the likes of Sandra Brown and Linda Howard, who write in the same genre. Otherwise, it's quite terrible! Zero plot, totally predictable and I hated the main characters!
Oh, yes, I should mention that Lisa is already dating Joel Peyton, another guy from her childhood. Although it's Scott who her loins burn for, she's so intent on resisting those feelings, she seems to think it's fine to string Joel along until she makes up her mind, even though she's pretty much fully aware that he does nothing for her, despite making out with him plenty of times. Gross! What utterly odious behaviour! And Scott is no better. Jealous that Lisa won't dump Joel, even though Scott's the one saying that he and Lisa can't date, Scott agrees to go on a date with Lisa's best friend, Nola. For real! He also likes to call her - at work - sexist terms such as "Princess" and "Baby", and refer to Joel as "Loverboy", which you would think would be very convincing grounds for a sexual harassment suit, but maybe Scott simply isn't a very good lawyer. Who know?
These two were awful. Disgusting! Even though she's 28 and he's 32, they're both acting like they're 12. They deserved each other and I didn't really care what happened to either of them! I liked Nola, who thankfully wasn't slut-shamed for her actions, and Joel turned out to be pretty decent, too. I would have much preferred a book featuring the two of them!
I kept reading to see if my prediction about the killer was right, and I was. The book is so lazy that it doesn't even return to the plot until the last 100 or so pages. It's all very predictable, and the climax is utterly pathetic. It kept me relatively involved, I'll give it that, and there were a couple of okay suspense sequences, but the stomach-churning, juvenile antics of the putrid protagonists really knocked most of the enjoyment out of this one.
June 20, 2012
TBR Challenge 2012--Personal Challenge: Shattered has been on my to-read list since 2010.
I thoroughly enjoyed this romantic suspense by Robards. The plotting is well done and I like both main characters. The mystery defies solution for most of the book. I could almost figure it out, but a few details prove elusive. The author does withhold one clue until the end, but it was necessary for the story.
Robards weaves all the parts of the story together, including the mutual history of Lisa and Scott. I liked that the heroine is no blushing ingenue, but instead an apologetically experienced woman.
I thoroughly enjoyed this romantic suspense by Robards. The plotting is well done and I like both main characters. The mystery defies solution for most of the book. I could almost figure it out, but a few details prove elusive. The author does withhold one clue until the end, but it was necessary for the story.
Robards weaves all the parts of the story together, including the mutual history of Lisa and Scott. I liked that the heroine is no blushing ingenue, but instead an apologetically experienced woman.
March 31, 2017
I just starting reading books by KR not too long ago. I haven't read one yet that I disliked. With this in mind, I almost did not finish this book. The first half I was reading at turtle speed. Last night I binge read it until 2am. The 2nd half took off like a grease fire! Absolutely everything great happened in the 2nd half of this book. Just when I thought I had it all figured out, BOOM, I was hit again. I give it 5 stars for pulling me in and not giving up.
April 1, 2016
The theme of this book really intrigued me, and it started off well; however, it was filled with foul language, there is an extremely graphic sex scene, and the dues ex machina villain left me severely disappointed.
April 5, 2021
Aspiring attorney Analisa Grant joins her exiled fellow research assistants to ‘Siberia’ (the basement) and encounters a cold-case file. The mother in the photograph bears an uncanny resemblance to Lisa.
Lisa returned to Kentucky to care for her ailing mum and undertakes investigating a research project, involving a cold case involving the disappearance of an entire family 28 years earlier. Michael Garcia, the husband, Angela his twenty-nine year old pregnant wife, their almost seven year-old son, Tony and five year-old, Marisa.
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May 1981
A giant crash from the kitchen, her mother screaming, a sound loud and shrill it hurt her ears, and her dad shouting in the distance. There was a sharp bang, then another, like firecrackers going off in the house.
"Mommy!"
Marisa found herself standing in the kitchen doorway, her dad lying facedown on the floor in what looked like a big puddle of bright red paint and her mother turning to face her with the front of her yellow sweater turning bright red, too.
"Run, Marisa," her mother shrieked, her face white and terrible. "Run, run, run!"
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Scott Buchanan glared at her out of light blue eyes that were, slightly bloodshot. His short, thick tobacco-brown hair looked as if he'd recently run his hands through it from sheer aggravation.
At age twenty-eight, Lisa had been told often enough that she was beautiful to have a healthy sense of her own self-assurance. Her eyes were large and caramel-brown, with a slight tilt to them.
Her beautiful, kindhearted, gentle-souled mother, the owner of Grayson Springs, had taken an interest in the young son of a neighbour from the time he'd first started doing odd jobs, for a couple of dollars when he was about twelve years old. As he grew up, he had pretty much spent his summers and after-school hours working on their farm. Martha Grant had invited him into the kitchen to eat (the meals were prepared by Elsa, the cook, and seen to it that there was always work for him when he came looking for it, and had done countless other things on his behalf; most of which Lisa suspected included making calls that got him the scholarship money he'd needed to swing college and beyond. That was why a month before, when the prestigious law firm she had worked for had gone belly-up and there had been no other jobs in the area to be had, she had swallowed her pride and come to him.
He hadn't exactly been gracious, but he'd given her a job. As a research assistant, at just a little more than half her previous pay. It was, he'd said, the only position available. Take it or leave it. She'd taken it. She'd looked at him out of those big caramel-colored eyes and explained her situation, said that she'd take anything and he'd caved. Knowing she was there in the same building bugged him. There’s had always been an undeniable attraction between Scott and herself, one neither has ever acted upon.
"Yo, Grant. What are you doing down here?"
"I've been banished."
"That reminds me. I was gonna call you to come down here and take a look at this anyway. What do you think of that?”
Lisa obediently looked. She frowned at what she saw. Secured with yellowing Scotch tape to the inside cover of the grungy manila folder was a Polaroid snapshot of what appeared to be a family: a young couple, two small children, and a dog. They sat close together on the front steps of a nondescript one-story ranch house, with the adults on the top step and the children, a boy and a girl, maybe six and four years old, respectively, on the bottom. The boy had his arm draped around a big black dog that sat, tongue lolling, beside him. The date, September 2, 1980, was scrawled in fading ink on the white strip at the bottom of the snapshot.
It was the woman, the mother, who caught her eye.
Lisa's first shocked thought was that she was looking at a picture of herself, almost thirty years in the past.
The image was small, old, and grainy--the woman in the picture looked enough like her to be her twin.
"The family name is Garcia. The parents are Michael and Angela, the kids Tony and Marisa," Gemmel added.
“So, what happened?"
"They disappeared. The whole family, including the dog. Vanished without a trace. One day the husband doesn't show up for work. Neither does the wife. The kids are absent from school. No answer when people try to get them on the phone. Finally somebody goes out to the house to check. They're gone."
The husband's car was missing, although the wife's car was still there. The house was ransacked. Dirty dishes from that night's supper were in the dishwasher, which hadn't yet been turned on. There was water in the bathtub, and a couple of floaty toys, too, and the dirty clothes the girl had been wearing that day were crumpled on the floor beside the tub. In other words, if they just took off on their own, all indications were that something caused their hasty departure.
"Tell her about the blood," Rinko said.
"There were indications that some blood had been spilled in the kitchen and cleaned up. Actually, a lot of blood”.
She begins to make eerie discoveries beginning with her doll. Her father is
C. Bartlett Grant, an esteemed federal judge, a former congressman who had once had far loftier political aspirations. But a losing Senate bid had soured him on personally pursuing public office. Though Lisa was his only natural child--he had acquired three stepsons upon his second marriage--their relationship had been rocky since the extremely contentious divorce from her mother, which had taken place when Lisa was six.
Scott’s comes across his nephew and a houseful of underage teenagers, partying and decides to give them a purpose by giving them an option of volunteering at his office for the summer, or contacting their parents.
Lisa takes the Garcia file home without permission and someone sees the file, setting the house on fire, to get rid of the evidence, adding to Martha’s already precarious failing health and fragile state; damaging their family home (the masterminds forgot about the oxygen tanks in the house). Lisa senses that her interest in the case seems to be triggering a sinister sequence of events. Each event seems aimed toward steering her from the past. The clothes Marisa had been wearing in the picture in the cold-case file appeared identical to the clothes her doll, Katrina was wearing.
As time passes, Lisa is haunted by information as more details seem too coincidental.
* She is drawn to visiting the Garcia property and is knocked into unconsciousness
* Rinko and the ‘wayward lambs’ continue their research and unearth a book award ribbon engraved with the name, Marisa Garcia
* Her brakes are cut and she is forced off the road with her mother losing her life and her almost drowning
* She makes the discovery that her father bought the doll for Marisa (the doll that resembled Marisa more closely than herself as the doll’s eyes are blue
After the funeral, the remains of human baby girl is recovered at Grayson Springs and Lisa is abducted by an assailant. Her mother, Martha and her father, Grant had a baby, a baby girl born with a fatal kidney disease. The human remains were recovered buried under a fountain in Grayson Springs's backyard during renovations from the fire.
Scott and Ryan intercept and accost Lisa’s father at gunpoint thinking he’s responsible for Lisa’s disappearance. The story begins to unravel, depicting a menacing story of Martha’s father, Mr. Carmody. He hired a detective to keep an eye on Grant in Washington.
Scott obtained Angela Garcia’s medical records. She was a little over eight months pregnant when she and her family disappeared. Grant was making regular child-support payments over a period of five years prior to her disappearance through a dummy corporation. The family moved to Kentucky a few months before their disappearance, and the husband was bragging that he was getting ready to come into a large sum of money. The baby buried under that fountain had ARPKD, same as Martha and Gran’s newborn baby. Lisa doesn't have, and never has had, ARPKD. She's Grant’s daughter, with Angela Garcia. He also fathered Angela's older daughter, Marisa, he bought Marisa the doll for her fifth birthday right before she vanished. Lisa has the doll, and the company kept the names and records of the purchasers of ‘My Best Friend’ dolls.
He was having an affair with Angela all those years in Washington, right under the noses of his wife and Angela’s husband. Then she got pregnant again and the husband found out. He wanted hush money, when he didn’t get the payout, he practically moved in next door to Martha and her wealthy father, who was funding his political career. Grant recognised that no matter how much he paid, he wasn’t going to be able to keep the husband quiet forever.
Lisa is his daughter with Angie Garcia. Her other daughter--Marisa--was also his daughter. Angie’s husband found out and threatened them. He was going to kill Angela and expose Grant if he didn't pay him a million dollars but all Grant’s money came from Martha's family.
He loved Angie, and Marisa, his little girl, and even her son, Tony. The sudden anguish in Grant's eyes made Scott's eyes narrow. "I never knew. They just disappeared. But then, as Lisa started to grow up, I noticed how much she looked like Angie, and I began to suspect."
"You began to suspect what?" Scott's voice was hoarse.
"It was the old man. Martha's father. He did something to them. He and that damned Frye.”
Lisa’s assailant dropped her into a well, an old, abandoned well with standing water in the bottom and three skeletons. The dumping ground.
“We never wanted to kill her. I thought Andy was going to die when she came home one day and started asking about those Garcias. Then I saw that file from where they disappeared in her bedroom, and I told him, and we knew we had to do something to get rid of it and get her mind on something else. Andy started a little fire, just a little fire right down the hallway from Lisa's bedroom”.
"So, Andrew Frye--Andy--set the fire."
"Yes. But we didn't mean to hurt Lisa, or Miss Martha. Only Andy forgot about Miss Martha's spare oxygen tanks, which were stored in her old bedroom right up there by Lisa's. The fire got to them and the whole place just went up."
"You didn't mean to hurt anybody."
"It was because she looked so much like them. If we'd realized she was going to look like that, we never would 've . . . well. Those dog tags you were talking about. Andy always wore them around his neck. He thought the chain had broken in the kitchen of that house the Garcias were renting. When she started to come in, he couldn't let her see him, so he had to do what he did. But he hated to do it, and he wouldn't have done it if she'd just let things alone. Which she never did do."
"So, it was all her fault."
"It was! You'd think, after Andy had to hit her over the head, she would have left it alone. But she didn't. Lisa's like that, you know. Real stubborn when she sets her mind to something. Miss Martha was always saying she didn't know where that had come from."
On Scott's other side, Barty made a restive movement. Lisa wondered, then, if Angela Garcia--impossible to think of her as her mother--had been stubborn. Of course Barty had known her well. Been in love with her, even. Lisa found she didn't much like the idea of that. Her loyalty to her mother was still strong.
“So, from there Andy decided to kill Mrs. Martha Grant by staging the car accident in which she drowned."
". . . never meant for Miss Martha to die! Andy didn't even know she was in the car. 'What was she doing in there?' She never rode in Lisa's car; it was too hard getting her in and out. Andy was in his truck across the street from the hospital parking lot when Lisa left, because that Buchanan boy"--Robin said that with real venom this time--"had somebody following Lisa, keeping an eye on her. Andy had been following her real close, just to see if he couldn't get a chance to maybe cause her to have a little fender bender, or do something else to scare her, until he figured out that somebody else was following her, too. But that night, Andy saw nobody was following her and he saw the chance to make her wreck her car. He wasn't really trying to kill her. He thought she'd survive, maybe have to go to the hospital. But maybe she'd be thinking about something besides those people, after that."
Lisa realized that she had never really felt anger before. Real anger was a hot, primitive tide that made you want to kill. She felt it now, looking at Robin, thinking of how scared her mother had been that night, of how she had died.
"But Mrs. Grant did die. Is that when Andy made up his mind to kill Lisa?"
“After Miss Martha died, we thought--Andy thought--Lisa would be so upset she'd forget all about those Garcias. And she might have, too. But then they found the baby.”
"You never wanted to hurt anybody, did you? I bet you didn't want to hurt that little baby we found under the fountain, either. But one of you suffocated her."
“Andy did it. Old Mr. Carmody--Miss Martha's father--told him to do it. She was so sick, but she was the sweetest little baby. The doctors all said she was going to die. That night, that night all these terrible things happened, I--I had come back in, all shaken up and I was rocking that little baby in my arms. Then Mr. Carmody came in and took her away from me. Andy came back carrying the baby, all wrapped in the blanket she'd been wrapped in when Mr. Carmody took her, all dressed in the same clothes, but not the same baby. I knew she was not the same baby. I knew what baby she was, because I'd watched her being born in the kitchen of that cursed house just a few hours before. Mr. Carmody had told him to smother my little baby, because the doctors had said she was going to die anyway, and if her baby died it would kill Miss Martha. So Mr. Carmody was going to save his daughter, whom he loved like nothing you've ever seen, by giving her a healthy baby who would live to grow up. He was going to give her that Garcia woman's baby”.
"Miss Martha--didn't realize that it was a different baby?"
Her father took her that very night to a sanitarium--and told them she was having a nervous breakdown because of her baby's health. He used his money and influence. They kept her for a month, and by the time she got back they’d all settled down and the baby--was thriving.
“After a while, we all, Andy and I, and Mr. Carmody, just kind of forgot what had happened. Just moved on, you know."
Just moved on. The words echoed through Lisa's mind. Just moved on, after having murdered an entire family and a helpless infant and wrenched her out of the life she had been born into and given her someone else's life.
“Okay, Mrs. Baker, let's move on to the night the Garcia family died”.
"I wasn't there, not at first. I was in the kitchen fixing supper. This man came banging on the back door”. It was Michael Garcia to see Mr. Carmody.
“Andy later told me that Mr. Carmody did know who he was, that he'd had a private detective checking into Mr. Grant because he thought he was being unfaithful to Miss Martha, he'd found this guy and his family, and knew all about Mr. Grant’s second family. Andy knew, because Mr. Carmody had sent Andy over to kind of check them out and report back. Andy had been there several times. A few minutes later Andy and Mr. Carmody left together. I saw Andy putting his rifle in his truck before he got in and drove off after Mr. Carmody, who was in his Mercedes. That's when I decided to follow them. By the time I got there, Mr. Carmody's car wasn't anywhere in sight, there were three people shot in that house. Michael Garcia was lying right by the door, and a woman was lying in the hall. She wasn't dead, but she was bleeding real bad, blood coming out everywhere, and that's when I realized she was pregnant and having a baby right there and then. She said, 'My babies,' and kind of jerked her hand toward the next room. I went in there, and I saw a boy. Just a little boy, and he'd been shot, and he was dead. I went outside and I saw a flashlight moving around over in the woods, and Andy came out of the woods. I said, 'What have you done?' He told me he'd only done what Mr. Carmody told him to do. Then he said I had to help him, that the little girl had run out of the house and was hiding in the woods. He was supposed to find her and kill her, too."
Lisa heard a sharp in-drawing of breath, and realized that it was Barty. Glancing past Scott, she saw that he was pale. Of course, that little girl, that woman, they would have been his family, too.
"So, did you find the little girl?"
“We did. She was all huddled down under a bush. We might not have found her, but she had a dog with her, a big black dog, and when we got close the dog started barking, and so we found her. When Andy turned his flashlight on her, she had her arms wrapped tight around this doll, and she wouldn't open her eyes and look at us."
"So, Andy killed her."
"No, he did not. I wouldn't let him. I couldn't do nothing about what had already been done, but I wasn't letting him kill a helpless little girl. I would have stopped the other if I could.”
“He didn't kill the little girl? Then what happened to her?"
"I made him take her out of there, her and her doll and that dog. It was just a plain old black dog, the only thing that might identify it was that it was wearing a blue collar that had its name, which was Lucy, and an address. We took the collar off, and we kept that dog at Grayson Springs."
"What happened to the little girl?"
“I cut her hair, made her leave her doll behind. Lisa found it down in the basement one day, when she was about three or four, and since Miss Martha was with her there wasn't much I could do but let her have it. Judy and her husband couldn't have kids. I told Judy that her dad had killed her mom and himself and there was no other family and it was a terrible mess, but she could have the little girl if she would keep her mouth shut about where she came from”.
"Are you saying Marisa Garcia is alive?"
"She's living up in Montana still. She's a nurse. She's Mary Frye now."
"I took the little girl away and left Andy to clean up the mess. He told me later when he got back in the house the woman had died but her baby had been born and was alive. He'd had some paramedic training in the military, so he knew how to take care of it, and that's what he did. After he got finished getting rid of the bodies, he brought it to Mr. Carmody”.
Lisa and Barty were getting to know one another better. Barty apologised for disappearing from her life, explaining his devastation when Angela Garcia disappeared, hopeful that somehow she'd persuaded her brute of a husband to move them away from Martha and her family. He kept expecting her to get in touch. When she didn't, he decided to accept it, for selfish reasons. But then Lisa started to grow up, and she began bearing a striking likeness to Angela. Just like Marisa. He suspected Martha’s father was involved. He was ruthless. Grant was scared, and he simply wanted to escape Grayson Springs and everything and everybody associated with it.
“I should have gone to the authorities with what I suspected, but if I had, I would have ruined myself, too. So, I just kept quiet, and went away, and made a new life." He took her hand, and she didn't pull it away. It felt as though they were in some way the sole survivors of a terrible accident.
"That makes me a coward, doesn't it? I apologize, Lisa. I see now how unfair it was to you.”
Lisa returned to Kentucky to care for her ailing mum and undertakes investigating a research project, involving a cold case involving the disappearance of an entire family 28 years earlier. Michael Garcia, the husband, Angela his twenty-nine year old pregnant wife, their almost seven year-old son, Tony and five year-old, Marisa.
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May 1981
A giant crash from the kitchen, her mother screaming, a sound loud and shrill it hurt her ears, and her dad shouting in the distance. There was a sharp bang, then another, like firecrackers going off in the house.
"Mommy!"
Marisa found herself standing in the kitchen doorway, her dad lying facedown on the floor in what looked like a big puddle of bright red paint and her mother turning to face her with the front of her yellow sweater turning bright red, too.
"Run, Marisa," her mother shrieked, her face white and terrible. "Run, run, run!"
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Scott Buchanan glared at her out of light blue eyes that were, slightly bloodshot. His short, thick tobacco-brown hair looked as if he'd recently run his hands through it from sheer aggravation.
At age twenty-eight, Lisa had been told often enough that she was beautiful to have a healthy sense of her own self-assurance. Her eyes were large and caramel-brown, with a slight tilt to them.
Her beautiful, kindhearted, gentle-souled mother, the owner of Grayson Springs, had taken an interest in the young son of a neighbour from the time he'd first started doing odd jobs, for a couple of dollars when he was about twelve years old. As he grew up, he had pretty much spent his summers and after-school hours working on their farm. Martha Grant had invited him into the kitchen to eat (the meals were prepared by Elsa, the cook, and seen to it that there was always work for him when he came looking for it, and had done countless other things on his behalf; most of which Lisa suspected included making calls that got him the scholarship money he'd needed to swing college and beyond. That was why a month before, when the prestigious law firm she had worked for had gone belly-up and there had been no other jobs in the area to be had, she had swallowed her pride and come to him.
He hadn't exactly been gracious, but he'd given her a job. As a research assistant, at just a little more than half her previous pay. It was, he'd said, the only position available. Take it or leave it. She'd taken it. She'd looked at him out of those big caramel-colored eyes and explained her situation, said that she'd take anything and he'd caved. Knowing she was there in the same building bugged him. There’s had always been an undeniable attraction between Scott and herself, one neither has ever acted upon.
"Yo, Grant. What are you doing down here?"
"I've been banished."
"That reminds me. I was gonna call you to come down here and take a look at this anyway. What do you think of that?”
Lisa obediently looked. She frowned at what she saw. Secured with yellowing Scotch tape to the inside cover of the grungy manila folder was a Polaroid snapshot of what appeared to be a family: a young couple, two small children, and a dog. They sat close together on the front steps of a nondescript one-story ranch house, with the adults on the top step and the children, a boy and a girl, maybe six and four years old, respectively, on the bottom. The boy had his arm draped around a big black dog that sat, tongue lolling, beside him. The date, September 2, 1980, was scrawled in fading ink on the white strip at the bottom of the snapshot.
It was the woman, the mother, who caught her eye.
Lisa's first shocked thought was that she was looking at a picture of herself, almost thirty years in the past.
The image was small, old, and grainy--the woman in the picture looked enough like her to be her twin.
"The family name is Garcia. The parents are Michael and Angela, the kids Tony and Marisa," Gemmel added.
“So, what happened?"
"They disappeared. The whole family, including the dog. Vanished without a trace. One day the husband doesn't show up for work. Neither does the wife. The kids are absent from school. No answer when people try to get them on the phone. Finally somebody goes out to the house to check. They're gone."
The husband's car was missing, although the wife's car was still there. The house was ransacked. Dirty dishes from that night's supper were in the dishwasher, which hadn't yet been turned on. There was water in the bathtub, and a couple of floaty toys, too, and the dirty clothes the girl had been wearing that day were crumpled on the floor beside the tub. In other words, if they just took off on their own, all indications were that something caused their hasty departure.
"Tell her about the blood," Rinko said.
"There were indications that some blood had been spilled in the kitchen and cleaned up. Actually, a lot of blood”.
She begins to make eerie discoveries beginning with her doll. Her father is
C. Bartlett Grant, an esteemed federal judge, a former congressman who had once had far loftier political aspirations. But a losing Senate bid had soured him on personally pursuing public office. Though Lisa was his only natural child--he had acquired three stepsons upon his second marriage--their relationship had been rocky since the extremely contentious divorce from her mother, which had taken place when Lisa was six.
Scott’s comes across his nephew and a houseful of underage teenagers, partying and decides to give them a purpose by giving them an option of volunteering at his office for the summer, or contacting their parents.
Lisa takes the Garcia file home without permission and someone sees the file, setting the house on fire, to get rid of the evidence, adding to Martha’s already precarious failing health and fragile state; damaging their family home (the masterminds forgot about the oxygen tanks in the house). Lisa senses that her interest in the case seems to be triggering a sinister sequence of events. Each event seems aimed toward steering her from the past. The clothes Marisa had been wearing in the picture in the cold-case file appeared identical to the clothes her doll, Katrina was wearing.
As time passes, Lisa is haunted by information as more details seem too coincidental.
* She is drawn to visiting the Garcia property and is knocked into unconsciousness
* Rinko and the ‘wayward lambs’ continue their research and unearth a book award ribbon engraved with the name, Marisa Garcia
* Her brakes are cut and she is forced off the road with her mother losing her life and her almost drowning
* She makes the discovery that her father bought the doll for Marisa (the doll that resembled Marisa more closely than herself as the doll’s eyes are blue
After the funeral, the remains of human baby girl is recovered at Grayson Springs and Lisa is abducted by an assailant. Her mother, Martha and her father, Grant had a baby, a baby girl born with a fatal kidney disease. The human remains were recovered buried under a fountain in Grayson Springs's backyard during renovations from the fire.
Scott and Ryan intercept and accost Lisa’s father at gunpoint thinking he’s responsible for Lisa’s disappearance. The story begins to unravel, depicting a menacing story of Martha’s father, Mr. Carmody. He hired a detective to keep an eye on Grant in Washington.
Scott obtained Angela Garcia’s medical records. She was a little over eight months pregnant when she and her family disappeared. Grant was making regular child-support payments over a period of five years prior to her disappearance through a dummy corporation. The family moved to Kentucky a few months before their disappearance, and the husband was bragging that he was getting ready to come into a large sum of money. The baby buried under that fountain had ARPKD, same as Martha and Gran’s newborn baby. Lisa doesn't have, and never has had, ARPKD. She's Grant’s daughter, with Angela Garcia. He also fathered Angela's older daughter, Marisa, he bought Marisa the doll for her fifth birthday right before she vanished. Lisa has the doll, and the company kept the names and records of the purchasers of ‘My Best Friend’ dolls.
He was having an affair with Angela all those years in Washington, right under the noses of his wife and Angela’s husband. Then she got pregnant again and the husband found out. He wanted hush money, when he didn’t get the payout, he practically moved in next door to Martha and her wealthy father, who was funding his political career. Grant recognised that no matter how much he paid, he wasn’t going to be able to keep the husband quiet forever.
Lisa is his daughter with Angie Garcia. Her other daughter--Marisa--was also his daughter. Angie’s husband found out and threatened them. He was going to kill Angela and expose Grant if he didn't pay him a million dollars but all Grant’s money came from Martha's family.
He loved Angie, and Marisa, his little girl, and even her son, Tony. The sudden anguish in Grant's eyes made Scott's eyes narrow. "I never knew. They just disappeared. But then, as Lisa started to grow up, I noticed how much she looked like Angie, and I began to suspect."
"You began to suspect what?" Scott's voice was hoarse.
"It was the old man. Martha's father. He did something to them. He and that damned Frye.”
Lisa’s assailant dropped her into a well, an old, abandoned well with standing water in the bottom and three skeletons. The dumping ground.
“We never wanted to kill her. I thought Andy was going to die when she came home one day and started asking about those Garcias. Then I saw that file from where they disappeared in her bedroom, and I told him, and we knew we had to do something to get rid of it and get her mind on something else. Andy started a little fire, just a little fire right down the hallway from Lisa's bedroom”.
"So, Andrew Frye--Andy--set the fire."
"Yes. But we didn't mean to hurt Lisa, or Miss Martha. Only Andy forgot about Miss Martha's spare oxygen tanks, which were stored in her old bedroom right up there by Lisa's. The fire got to them and the whole place just went up."
"You didn't mean to hurt anybody."
"It was because she looked so much like them. If we'd realized she was going to look like that, we never would 've . . . well. Those dog tags you were talking about. Andy always wore them around his neck. He thought the chain had broken in the kitchen of that house the Garcias were renting. When she started to come in, he couldn't let her see him, so he had to do what he did. But he hated to do it, and he wouldn't have done it if she'd just let things alone. Which she never did do."
"So, it was all her fault."
"It was! You'd think, after Andy had to hit her over the head, she would have left it alone. But she didn't. Lisa's like that, you know. Real stubborn when she sets her mind to something. Miss Martha was always saying she didn't know where that had come from."
On Scott's other side, Barty made a restive movement. Lisa wondered, then, if Angela Garcia--impossible to think of her as her mother--had been stubborn. Of course Barty had known her well. Been in love with her, even. Lisa found she didn't much like the idea of that. Her loyalty to her mother was still strong.
“So, from there Andy decided to kill Mrs. Martha Grant by staging the car accident in which she drowned."
". . . never meant for Miss Martha to die! Andy didn't even know she was in the car. 'What was she doing in there?' She never rode in Lisa's car; it was too hard getting her in and out. Andy was in his truck across the street from the hospital parking lot when Lisa left, because that Buchanan boy"--Robin said that with real venom this time--"had somebody following Lisa, keeping an eye on her. Andy had been following her real close, just to see if he couldn't get a chance to maybe cause her to have a little fender bender, or do something else to scare her, until he figured out that somebody else was following her, too. But that night, Andy saw nobody was following her and he saw the chance to make her wreck her car. He wasn't really trying to kill her. He thought she'd survive, maybe have to go to the hospital. But maybe she'd be thinking about something besides those people, after that."
Lisa realized that she had never really felt anger before. Real anger was a hot, primitive tide that made you want to kill. She felt it now, looking at Robin, thinking of how scared her mother had been that night, of how she had died.
"But Mrs. Grant did die. Is that when Andy made up his mind to kill Lisa?"
“After Miss Martha died, we thought--Andy thought--Lisa would be so upset she'd forget all about those Garcias. And she might have, too. But then they found the baby.”
"You never wanted to hurt anybody, did you? I bet you didn't want to hurt that little baby we found under the fountain, either. But one of you suffocated her."
“Andy did it. Old Mr. Carmody--Miss Martha's father--told him to do it. She was so sick, but she was the sweetest little baby. The doctors all said she was going to die. That night, that night all these terrible things happened, I--I had come back in, all shaken up and I was rocking that little baby in my arms. Then Mr. Carmody came in and took her away from me. Andy came back carrying the baby, all wrapped in the blanket she'd been wrapped in when Mr. Carmody took her, all dressed in the same clothes, but not the same baby. I knew she was not the same baby. I knew what baby she was, because I'd watched her being born in the kitchen of that cursed house just a few hours before. Mr. Carmody had told him to smother my little baby, because the doctors had said she was going to die anyway, and if her baby died it would kill Miss Martha. So Mr. Carmody was going to save his daughter, whom he loved like nothing you've ever seen, by giving her a healthy baby who would live to grow up. He was going to give her that Garcia woman's baby”.
"Miss Martha--didn't realize that it was a different baby?"
Her father took her that very night to a sanitarium--and told them she was having a nervous breakdown because of her baby's health. He used his money and influence. They kept her for a month, and by the time she got back they’d all settled down and the baby--was thriving.
“After a while, we all, Andy and I, and Mr. Carmody, just kind of forgot what had happened. Just moved on, you know."
Just moved on. The words echoed through Lisa's mind. Just moved on, after having murdered an entire family and a helpless infant and wrenched her out of the life she had been born into and given her someone else's life.
“Okay, Mrs. Baker, let's move on to the night the Garcia family died”.
"I wasn't there, not at first. I was in the kitchen fixing supper. This man came banging on the back door”. It was Michael Garcia to see Mr. Carmody.
“Andy later told me that Mr. Carmody did know who he was, that he'd had a private detective checking into Mr. Grant because he thought he was being unfaithful to Miss Martha, he'd found this guy and his family, and knew all about Mr. Grant’s second family. Andy knew, because Mr. Carmody had sent Andy over to kind of check them out and report back. Andy had been there several times. A few minutes later Andy and Mr. Carmody left together. I saw Andy putting his rifle in his truck before he got in and drove off after Mr. Carmody, who was in his Mercedes. That's when I decided to follow them. By the time I got there, Mr. Carmody's car wasn't anywhere in sight, there were three people shot in that house. Michael Garcia was lying right by the door, and a woman was lying in the hall. She wasn't dead, but she was bleeding real bad, blood coming out everywhere, and that's when I realized she was pregnant and having a baby right there and then. She said, 'My babies,' and kind of jerked her hand toward the next room. I went in there, and I saw a boy. Just a little boy, and he'd been shot, and he was dead. I went outside and I saw a flashlight moving around over in the woods, and Andy came out of the woods. I said, 'What have you done?' He told me he'd only done what Mr. Carmody told him to do. Then he said I had to help him, that the little girl had run out of the house and was hiding in the woods. He was supposed to find her and kill her, too."
Lisa heard a sharp in-drawing of breath, and realized that it was Barty. Glancing past Scott, she saw that he was pale. Of course, that little girl, that woman, they would have been his family, too.
"So, did you find the little girl?"
“We did. She was all huddled down under a bush. We might not have found her, but she had a dog with her, a big black dog, and when we got close the dog started barking, and so we found her. When Andy turned his flashlight on her, she had her arms wrapped tight around this doll, and she wouldn't open her eyes and look at us."
"So, Andy killed her."
"No, he did not. I wouldn't let him. I couldn't do nothing about what had already been done, but I wasn't letting him kill a helpless little girl. I would have stopped the other if I could.”
“He didn't kill the little girl? Then what happened to her?"
"I made him take her out of there, her and her doll and that dog. It was just a plain old black dog, the only thing that might identify it was that it was wearing a blue collar that had its name, which was Lucy, and an address. We took the collar off, and we kept that dog at Grayson Springs."
"What happened to the little girl?"
“I cut her hair, made her leave her doll behind. Lisa found it down in the basement one day, when she was about three or four, and since Miss Martha was with her there wasn't much I could do but let her have it. Judy and her husband couldn't have kids. I told Judy that her dad had killed her mom and himself and there was no other family and it was a terrible mess, but she could have the little girl if she would keep her mouth shut about where she came from”.
"Are you saying Marisa Garcia is alive?"
"She's living up in Montana still. She's a nurse. She's Mary Frye now."
"I took the little girl away and left Andy to clean up the mess. He told me later when he got back in the house the woman had died but her baby had been born and was alive. He'd had some paramedic training in the military, so he knew how to take care of it, and that's what he did. After he got finished getting rid of the bodies, he brought it to Mr. Carmody”.
Lisa and Barty were getting to know one another better. Barty apologised for disappearing from her life, explaining his devastation when Angela Garcia disappeared, hopeful that somehow she'd persuaded her brute of a husband to move them away from Martha and her family. He kept expecting her to get in touch. When she didn't, he decided to accept it, for selfish reasons. But then Lisa started to grow up, and she began bearing a striking likeness to Angela. Just like Marisa. He suspected Martha’s father was involved. He was ruthless. Grant was scared, and he simply wanted to escape Grayson Springs and everything and everybody associated with it.
“I should have gone to the authorities with what I suspected, but if I had, I would have ruined myself, too. So, I just kept quiet, and went away, and made a new life." He took her hand, and she didn't pull it away. It felt as though they were in some way the sole survivors of a terrible accident.
"That makes me a coward, doesn't it? I apologize, Lisa. I see now how unfair it was to you.”
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
May 7, 2019
The prologue describes 5 year old Marisa Garcia and her 7 year old brother walking home with their mother. Marisa feels a dark presence in the wooks surrounding their home in Kentucky. A few minutes later, Marisa's mother and father are shot in their kitchen and Marisa takes off running. In present day, Lisa Grant returned home to Kentucky to be with her mother who is in the final stages of ALS. Lisa works as a research assistant to the local district attorney Scott Buchanan. While working a cold case, she spots a photograph of a family that disappeared thirty years ago and the woman has an amazing resemblance to Lisa. She takes the file home and arson occurs. That won't stop her investigation into what happened to the family and why she looks so much like the missing mother.
This book is a romantic suspense first published in 2010. I liked the descriptions of the gorgeous Grayson Springs home and the designer clothes worn by Lisa. I had thought of a couple reasons for the resemblance in the photo but I was wrong. Sometimes my overactive imagination doesn't get me to the right place. The end was so simple I wondered why I didn't think of that. I guess that's part of the reason Karen Robards is an author and I'm only a reader.
This book is a romantic suspense first published in 2010. I liked the descriptions of the gorgeous Grayson Springs home and the designer clothes worn by Lisa. I had thought of a couple reasons for the resemblance in the photo but I was wrong. Sometimes my overactive imagination doesn't get me to the right place. The end was so simple I wondered why I didn't think of that. I guess that's part of the reason Karen Robards is an author and I'm only a reader.
June 25, 2017
Oh my God, I loved this book. I have read just about all of Karen Robards book and have enjoyed everyone of them. Shattered was so freaking good that I was so disappointed when the book end...I wanted more of it. I normally can figure out "who done it", but this time I was thrown for a loop. So shocked I never would have guessed who and why. Great job on this book Karen...😲 I was guessing all the way to the end. Please check this book out if you like romance, suspense, and above all Karen Robards books!!!
January 3, 2019
This is the first book I have read by (Karen Robards) and will be my last... However, parts the book was fairly good, but towards the ending got very confusing. I have so many authors that I truly love reading, decided not to add her to my list!!! Still was a good read but not good enough to continue, with this Author...
June 4, 2020
Good plot enjoyed reading this book.
August 14, 2019
I truly enjoyed this thriller and all the secrets that are revealed. The characters are truly enjoyable also!
February 11, 2019
2 stars. There were a few things I liked, some I thoroughly disliked about this book 😬
The hero? He’s such an a**hole 🤦🏻♀️ but oddly enough the author was able to make it not too annoying 🤷🏻♀️ or maybe I was in the mood for some a**holery (? 🤔) or something 😂 He was so rude to the heroine at times 😳 I don’t know why I didn’t get offended on her behalf. I usually do. Maybe it’s the long history between the MCs? Or maybe it’s the heroine’s attitude when he’s being a jerk: like water off a duck’s back, like she’s used to dealing with the hero’s moronic behaviors 🤷🏻♀️ I don’t know. But it worked for me 😄
The things that irked me: some things/events made very little sense. For instance, the heroine wearing a sponge bob square pants t-shirt because Robin (long time family employee) got it hastily for her at some 24/7 Walmart. I mean, they sell about 1000 different shirts/sweaters/everything in-between for women at Walmart’s. Surely she could have bought something else 🙄 There’s a lot of highly convenient events/stuff happening, too. Like, TOO convenient. Finding the baby’s skeleton exactly at the right time and such. Meh 🙄
The fact that the heroine even thinks that the fire was a way to destroy evidence that she’d brought home with her makes no sense either. 🤦🏻♀️ It would be the very last thing/reason I would think of at this point in the story.
I liked the hero but didn’t like the heroine as much - thought she was too highly delusional/in denial, always making up excuses for what was happening. It (the writing) was odd, really: she would think about whatever event and (correctly) identify that it was linked to the cold-case, but then she’d think “oh no, it’s probably just this or that”. 🤦🏻♀️ It made for a boring read because things are told and there is no guessing or questioning on the reader’s part: you know why things are happening but the heroine is too stupid/in denial to accept them.
I did like the storyline. Thought it was original and interesting. Just wasn’t a fan of the writing.
The hero? He’s such an a**hole 🤦🏻♀️ but oddly enough the author was able to make it not too annoying 🤷🏻♀️ or maybe I was in the mood for some a**holery (? 🤔) or something 😂 He was so rude to the heroine at times 😳 I don’t know why I didn’t get offended on her behalf. I usually do. Maybe it’s the long history between the MCs? Or maybe it’s the heroine’s attitude when he’s being a jerk: like water off a duck’s back, like she’s used to dealing with the hero’s moronic behaviors 🤷🏻♀️ I don’t know. But it worked for me 😄
The things that irked me: some things/events made very little sense. For instance, the heroine wearing a sponge bob square pants t-shirt because Robin (long time family employee) got it hastily for her at some 24/7 Walmart. I mean, they sell about 1000 different shirts/sweaters/everything in-between for women at Walmart’s. Surely she could have bought something else 🙄 There’s a lot of highly convenient events/stuff happening, too. Like, TOO convenient. Finding the baby’s skeleton exactly at the right time and such. Meh 🙄
The fact that the heroine even thinks that the fire was a way to destroy evidence that she’d brought home with her makes no sense either. 🤦🏻♀️ It would be the very last thing/reason I would think of at this point in the story.
I liked the hero but didn’t like the heroine as much - thought she was too highly delusional/in denial, always making up excuses for what was happening. It (the writing) was odd, really: she would think about whatever event and (correctly) identify that it was linked to the cold-case, but then she’d think “oh no, it’s probably just this or that”. 🤦🏻♀️ It made for a boring read because things are told and there is no guessing or questioning on the reader’s part: you know why things are happening but the heroine is too stupid/in denial to accept them.
I did like the storyline. Thought it was original and interesting. Just wasn’t a fan of the writing.
February 22, 2014
*spoilers ahead*
i think my biggest problem with this book is that i never felt like i had a choice in speculating on the connection between lisa and the garcias because from the onset, when strange things started happening to lisa, she immediately connected it with the garcia case when she doesn't even know them or anything about the case except that she looked like them.
second problem is that the story focused more on the love story between lisa and the guy and the various accidents and attempts on lisa's life when they dont even have a suspect, they have not done a lot of research on the garcias (except going to the place) and have not even met anyone who knows them. in addition, all the investigative work happened at the background, with the guy only telling us the results. so i never felt like i was part of the crime / mystery solving team.
it was only at the last two chapters where the author finally identified the killer and made them tell the whole story and that is when everything that has happened in the book made sense.
overall, while this was a good read and fast paced, i can only give 3.5 stars because of my problems with the logic of the story.
i think my biggest problem with this book is that i never felt like i had a choice in speculating on the connection between lisa and the garcias because from the onset, when strange things started happening to lisa, she immediately connected it with the garcia case when she doesn't even know them or anything about the case except that she looked like them.
second problem is that the story focused more on the love story between lisa and the guy and the various accidents and attempts on lisa's life when they dont even have a suspect, they have not done a lot of research on the garcias (except going to the place) and have not even met anyone who knows them. in addition, all the investigative work happened at the background, with the guy only telling us the results. so i never felt like i was part of the crime / mystery solving team.
it was only at the last two chapters where the author finally identified the killer and made them tell the whole story and that is when everything that has happened in the book made sense.
overall, while this was a good read and fast paced, i can only give 3.5 stars because of my problems with the logic of the story.
July 2, 2011
Lisa Grant was a rising star in a law firm in Kentucky. But when the firm went bankrupt she lost her job. So she came home to care for her ailing mother. She took the first job she could find, research assistant to the district attorney. But after missing an imortant court date Lisa gets banished to the basement to sort through cold case files. But what she expects to be a boring job becomes interesting.When she runs across a missing persons case an entire family disappeared more than 28 years ago. Except thats not all the mother in the old photo accompanying the file looks exactly like Lisa she could be her twin. Before Lisa can find out more about the case a series of catastropes strikes close to home. And she realizes finding the photo has put her in danger. She confides in Scott the District Attorney and together they unravel a terrifing web of criminal connections. That could shatter what Lisa knows of her past. And someone is determined to make certain the secrets stay hidden.
May 18, 2010
This is a really good book. You have mystery and romance all rolled into one. The Mystery: why does Lisa look like the woman in the picture, that is suppose to have come up missing, so much? Where did they disappear too? Then strange things start to happen to Lisa. Her house catches on fire, someone knocks her over the head, someone is following her, and then someone makes her wreak her car. The Romance: Scott, he's one good looking guy and sexy too. He's someone Lisa has know since childhood. He was the boy from the poor side of town who used to work on their farm. Now he's the District Attorney. And Lisa is working for him. The sparks start flying and then it happens. Boom, at the Fourth of July party at the country club. They can't keep from looking and touching. The rest is for you to find out for yourself.
July 13, 2010
This was okay. My first time reading this author. The mystery was intriguing and kept me guessing although you knew generally what was up but there was just enough doubt to not be sure and to keep the reader guessing. The romance was hot while at the same time sweet but wasn't real intense. There was not a lot of doubt where the relationship was going, not any real big conflict. They had always had the hots for each other and when the hero decided to stop running from her (a habit from when she was a teenager and he was too old for her) they fell in bed and pretty much knew they were together. He supported her through the figuring out of the mystery. That is the sort of thing that is great in real life but doesn't add much tension to a romance novel.
I may give this author another try, maybe one of her older books.
I may give this author another try, maybe one of her older books.
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