NEVER FEAR
By Scott Frost
G.P. Putnam's Sons/
Penguin Group
www.penguin.com
ISBN: 0399153403
291 pages, Hardback, $24.95 US
Genre: Mystery

LA Detective Alex Delillo has sent her daughter off to college and is expecting her biggest worries will center around an empty nest. But before she can feel the first pang, she receives an incomplete fax which turns out to be from a half-brother she never knew about, whose dead body is discovered near where three young women were murdered 17 years earlier. Unknown to Alex, her estranged father was and remains the primary suspect in those prior murders. Although her brother's death is ruled a suicide, Alex suspects otherwise. With the help of her subordinate Detective Dylan Harrison, Alex begins to reconstruct her brother's hours preceding his death, and every avenue she explores leads her back to her father and the three women who were murdered 17 years ago.

Never Fear is a fast-paced mystery with plenty of twists and turns and red herrings at every corner. Single mother Alex Delillo is a fresh character, a gutsy woman with issues struggling to protect her college-aged daughter while chasing bad guys.