REVIEW:

The Silence of the Lambs and The Lost Symbol got together and had a little book baby named The Cipher.

Let's unwrap this bundle of joy.

A young female FBI agent works with an older male colleague from the Behavior Analysis Unit to track a serial killer by solving the clues he leaves behind while zigzagging all over the country. Fortunately for us, baby Cipher differs from its Book Mama and Book Papa because its main protagonist was once an escaped victim of the killer, and there’s also way less tweed.

But I kid, I kid. The Cipher is actually a refreshing update on the hunted serial killer trope given its #ownvoices lineage. Both our heroine, Nina Guerrara, and the author are Latina. Isabella Maldonado’s bio is quite impressive: "A graduate of the FBI National Academy in Quantico and the first Latina to attain the rank of captain in her police department, she retired as the Commander of Special Investigations and Forensics." Yeah, I think I’m interested in her take on the genre! I was thoroughly engaged in the cat and mouse game she crafted, and consider me signed up for the forthcoming sequel.

The Cipher is currently available on Kindle Unlimited with WhisperSync for those who may prefer listening on audio. (As of 2/10/21.)

(Side eye side note: It appears the movie rights have already been snatched up by the 51-year-old JLo for Netflix. Ms. Lopez will be playing the 27-year-old Nina. Insert line mouth emoji here.)

PUBLISHER SYNOPSIS:

To a cunning serial killer, she was the one that got away. Until now…

FBI Special Agent Nina Guerrera escaped a serial killer’s trap at sixteen. Years later, when she’s jumped in a Virginia park, a video of the attack goes viral. Legions of new fans are not the only ones impressed with her fighting skills. The man who abducted her eleven years ago is watching. Determined to reclaim his lost prize, he commits a grisly murder designed to pull her into the investigation…but his games are just beginning. And he’s using the internet to invite the public to play along.

His coded riddles may have made him a depraved social media superstar—an enigmatic cyber-ghost dubbed “the Cipher”—but to Nina he’s a monster who preys on the vulnerable. Partnered with the FBI’s preeminent mind hunter, Dr. Jeffrey Wade, who is haunted by his own past, Nina tracks the predator across the country. Clue by clue, victim by victim, Nina races to stop a deadly killer while the world watches.