The Forgotten Daughter: A Christian Novel

by Russell Knight

The Forgotten Daughter
A Christian Small-Town Detective Thriller About a Vanished Girl and a Secret That Won’t Stay Buried
by Russell Knight

📚 She vanished. The town forgot. But God didn’t.

Twenty-one years ago, teenager Claire Lawson disappeared from Ashford Hollow. Branded a runaway. Dismissed. Forgotten. Until now.

Veteran detective Gabriel Foster, a man shaped by failure and flickers of faith, receives an anonymous envelope with a photo of Claire—dated after the investigation closed—and a charm bracelet stained with blood. Haunted by the case that broke him, Gabriel reopens the files nobody wants touched. The trail leads straight into a web of small-town corruption, spiritual manipulation, and buried trauma.

As Gabriel uncovers lies wrapped in scripture and silence, he must confront not only institutional power but his own crisis of faith. Because finding Claire isn’t just about justice—it’s about redemption. And in a town that teaches obedience above truth, someone still believes obedience must be enforced at any cost.

Will Gabriel risk everything—even his soul—to bring light into the darkness?


If you’re drawn ✅ Small-town thrillers soaked in secrets and suspense
✅ Emotionally complex Christian detectives wrestling with doubt and calling
✅ Gripping mysteries that blend faith, justice, and psychological depth

Then The Forgotten Daughter will grip you from the first page—and stay with you long after the last.

🕊 A story of faith in the face of silence. Of justice when the system fails. Of a girl who was never lost… only taken.

Clean Crime Thriller with Christian themes.

Available now in Kindle, Kindle Unlimited, Audible, and Paperback.

286 pages, Kindle Edition

Published May 10, 2025

Reviews

[Liliana Kerr]

Okee, so I started this book and it was actually really really good! I loved the christian aspect of if and the undercover spy thing was definitely fun.
However.
The last 50-100 pages were soooo slooowwwwww and absolutely had no reason at all none whatsoever to be there and were probably there to just make it longer. They lacked the same fast paced mystery as the rest of the book.

If you are christian and you like mystery, go ahead! Its honestly a really good book! Just not for me 🙃 I'll stick with Kate Parker and her victorian mysteries :)

[Brett Nelson]

This was a good book that I found on Kindle Unlimited. It's always good to find those rare Christian fiction unicorns that don't involve a romance, so if you're looking for a non-romance, this would be a good one to check out. I really enjoyed it up to about the 60% mark in the ebook, when you found out who did it, then the last 40% of the ebook was a sloggish and drawn-out description of everyone that was involved. It's aways good to find out the guilty and motives in books like this, but I lost interest quickly in the ending because it was too drawn out. Other than the ending, it was a good one. I'd suggest checking this one out.

[M Jane]

The Forgotten Daughter

Excellent work. The deepest mystery I’ve read in a long while.
The story is totally unique, the connections between the victims and the detective’s tie it all together and very interesting way the loss was written, the story was excellent.

[Bethany]

Very Good Read

I will definitely be looking for more books by this author! Good, clean with enough mystery to keep you turning pages!