‘Pieces of Her’ Asks If It Is Ever Truly Possible to Know Those We Love [REVIEW]

After watching her mother perform an unexpected act of violence, Andy can’t help but wonder if she ever knew her mother at all in Karin Slaughter’s Pieces of Her. (Photo by Dave, Flickr)

Two women bound by blood. They think they know everything about one another. Then a deadly event throws their relationship into a tailspin. Now the question begs to be answered: is it ever really possible to know someone completely? Find out in Karin Slaughter’s new stand-alone thriller, Pieces of Her. 

William Morrow

Andrea Oliver (or Andy, as most people call her) is a 31-year-old woman who walks away from college to nurse her mother, Laura, back to health from breast cancer. Now living above her parents’ garage, she works third shift as a 911 operator to save money and pay off school debt.

One day Andy and Laura go out to eat when a woman stops to chat with them at their table. Suddenly, the woman is shot and drops where she is standing. Instinctively, Laura tackles her daughter to the ground in order to protect her, leaving Andy to wonder where that instinct came from.

The next thing Andy knows, a man is pointing a gun at her mother’s chest. The gunman realizes Andy is wearing a badge and mistakes her for a cop. Meanwhile, Laura negotiates with the man until she is close enough to kill him. But none of this adds up. How does her mom know how to do any of this, Andy wonders. Thus begins her quest to find out who her mother really is.

With Pieces of Her, Slaughter makes us take a close hard look at the relationships in our lives and reminds us that we only see what people want us to see. Everyone wears masks to hide who they really are. And sometimes we simply don’t want to see the evidence in front of our eyes. Slaughter develops just this kind of emotional psyche for Andy, and it makes for an authentic, albeit alarming, storyline that is utterly compelling.

Even as she methodically rips away at the facade Laura has constructed around herself and the illusory life she has built with her family, Slaughter infuses each scene between the two women with raw, tangible emotion. This ensures readers are drawn in and become vested in the story, quickly turning pages to get at the truth behind all the lies. By turns visceral, graphic, shocking, and bold, Pieces of Her is unlike anything Slaughter has ever written and definitely isn’t for the faint of heart. Nevertheless, it is an engrossing mystery that will delight devoted fans and likely garner her some new ones.

Karin Slaughter
(Photo by Alison Rosa)

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Karin Slaughter is one of the world’s most popular and acclaimed storytellers. Published in 120 countries with more than 35 million copies sold across the globe, her 18 novels include the Grant County and Will Trent books, as well as the Edgar-nominated Cop Town and the instant New York Times bestselling novels Pretty Girls and The Good Daughter.

Slaughter is the founder of the Save the Libraries project—a nonprofit organization established to support libraries and library programming. A native of Georgia, Karin Slaughter lives in Atlanta. Her standalone novels The Good Daughter and Cop Town are in development for film and television.

Find out more about Karin at her home on the Web at KarinSlaughter.com, like her on Facebook, and follow her on Twitter and Instagram.

PIECES OF HER
By Karin Slaughter
480 pgs. William Morrow. $27.99

Purchase Pieces of Her at one of these fine online retailers: Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Books-A-Million, HarperCollins, IndieBound, and Powell’s.

Pieces of Her is brought to you in association with TLC Book Tours.