Becky Masterman: If a Face Could Kill

Former FBI agent Brigid Quinn, is drawn into the aftermath of her neighbour Dorita Gordino’s murder. The same woman who started a NIMBY petition about the new group home in the neighbourhood. Was this retribution?

It’s a simple premise for this book but the nuances are remarkable. While the setup promises both a close-to-home mystery and a reckoning with past guilt, the storyline points toward something deeper and more emotionally layered.

Take Quinn herself, her experience, and moral weariness make her one of the more distinctive protagonists in contemporary suspense. Not a quick-to-action hero but a seasoned woman carrying regret, intelligence, and an unsentimental view of human behavior.

Becky Masterman blends suspense with conscience, allowing the investigation to become not just a search for a killer but an inquiry into culpability, and memory.

If A Face Could Kill exhibits Quinn’s hard-won experience and the dry intelligence to explore both the mystery of Gordino’s murder and a reckoning with her own past. Well recommended read.