Lost Souls (A Bentz/Montoya Novel)

As a thriller this book serves its purpose. The killer might not be a unique spin on the serial killer archetype, but the

Four girls have gone missing at All Saints College, but none of their bodies have been found so the police can't call foul play. So instead we get Kristi Benz, two-time

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almost-victim and wannabe true crime writer, playing detective. I'm sorry to say this, but Kristi is TSTL (too stupid to live). Seriously, her motive for getting near a serial killer, even though she knows the danger, is so she can write about it. Doesn't she know the best true crime novel, IN COLD BLOOD, was written after the killers were behind bars?

While Kristi's motive may be dumb, it's straightforward. Unfortunately, Vlad's interest in Kristi is inexplicable. He seems to have a history with her, but she certainly doesn't recognize him. (Perhaps I'm missing something from an earlier book - I've never read any of Jackson's work before.) Also, his victims are all "lost souls," girls without close friends or family. Serial killers tend to be picky. So why would Vlad be interested in a woman with a loving father (who happens to be a famous detective) and a close boyfriend?

I cannot condemn the book though. Even with my dislike of the protagonist, Jackson kept me turning the pages. LOST SOULS is a serviceable thriller, but it could be much better.

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Not her best, by far. Actually a big disappointment!

Kristi Bentz, daughter to New Orleans Detective Rick Bentz is heading back to college. She has enrolled as a student at All Saints College. A college that has been made famous not for the teachers or classes but because four women have all gone missing in a eighteen month span. The police believe

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the women are runaways.

Kristi wants to write a true crime novel. When she hears about the missing women, she decides to do some investigate work. Kristi learns that all of the women attended the same class with Dr. Dominic Grotto. Dr. Grotto teaches a class on vampyrism. One of Kristi's old classmates, Lucretia Stevens tells Kristi about how she suspects one of the girls...a Rylee was in a cult. Now Kristi is really intrigued. What is Dr. Grotto's connection to the missing women and could he be a vampire?

The only person Kristi can get to believe her that the women did not go missing on their own is her ex-boyfriend, Jay McKnight. As Kristi gets closer to uncovering the truth, it brings her just one more step closer to evil himself.

It was great to see Kristi and Rick Bentz back again. Detective Bentz is one of the most famous and one of my favorite detectives around. He may come off hard as nails but that is only because he really cares about the ones around him and would do everything he could to keep them protected. Lost Souls still featured Rick but this time he stepped out of the picture to let Kristi shine. Kristi definetly takes after her father. I liked this more supernatural approach that Mrs. Jackson took with Lost Souls but with still keeping in her usual fashion of producing a good thriller. All I have to say is when Rick Bentz is involved, no one inculding vampires stand a chance. Lost Souls leaves the reader with a cliff hanger that leading right into Malice the next book from Lisa.

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A pretty decent romantic thriller - not my favorite book, but entertaining mind candy.

Admittedly, the thought of our heroine now targeted three times by serial killers strains credulity, but it doesn't do so any more than Patricia Cornwell's books where Kay Scarpetta and team are constantly being

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beaten, burned, or otherwise mutilated by same. If you're willing to go along with Scarpetta then this shouldn't be a problem.

My only other quibble is with location. This is labeled as part of the author's New Orleans series, but it takes place in Baton Rouge - definitely not New Orleans. Aside from the fact that they are about 80 miles (or an hour and a half or so) apart, they are also very different in feel and in culture - among other things Baton Rouge didn't really start growing until 1910 so it's a much younger city.

All told, though, this was a decent read in the category of what I like to call grocery store books. These are the cheap paperbacks that they sell with the magazines at your local grocery store. You buy them because you want something trashy and entertaining to read - the literary equivalent of sour cream and onion potato chips.

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A lovely suspense story. Read the book in one night. It was fun to read and I would read it again.

One of her best! A great audio! Twenty-seven-year-old Kristi Bentz is lucky to be alive. Not many people her age have nearly died twice at the hands of a serial killer, and lived to tell about it. Her dad, New Orleans detective, Rick Bentz, wants Kristi to stay in New Orleans and out of danger. But

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if anything, Kristi's experiences have made her even more fascinated by the mind of the serial killer. She hasn't given up her dream of being a true-crime writer--of exploring the darkest recesses of evil--and now she just may get her chance.

Four girls have disappeared at All Saints College in less than two years. All four were "lost souls"--troubled, vulnerable girls with no one to care about them, no one to come looking if they disappeared. The police think they're runaways, but Kristi senses there's something that links them, something terrifying. She decides to enroll, following their same steps. All Saints has changed a lot since Kristi was an undergraduate. The stodgy Catholic college has lured edgy new professors to its campus and gained a reputation for envelope-pushing, with classes like the very popular "The Influence of Vampirism in Modern Culture and Literature," and elaborately staged morality plays that feel more like the titillating entertainment of some underground club than religious spectacles. And there are whispers of a dark cult on campus whose members wear vials of blood around their necks and meet in secret chambers--rituals to which only the elite have access. To find the truth, Kristi will need to become part of the cult's inner circle, to learn their secrets, and play the part of lost soul without losing herself in the process. It's a dangerous path, and Kristi is skating on its knife-thin edge.

The deeper she goes, the more Kristi begins to wonder if she is the hunter or the prey. She's certain she's being watched and followed--studied, even--as yet another girl disappears, and another. And when the bodies finally begin to surface--in ways that bring fear to the campus and terror to the hearts of even hardened cops like Detective Bentz and his partner Reuben Montoya--Kristi realizes with chilling clarity that she has underestimated her foe. She is playing a game with a killer more cunning and bloodthirsty than anyone can imagine, one who has personally selected her for membership in a cult of death from which there will be no escape.

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This was my first time that i read Lisa Jackson. Kristi Bentz walk in to relentless and an un bearable thrill ride that can make you wounder if that stuff really happens in real life. I injoyed this book can wait to read more of her books.

Good, not great story of several missing girls, all from the same small college, and all took the same courses - - one of them a class on vampires. Kristi decides to investigate the story as she plans to become a crime writer after college.