Criminal by Karin Slaughter

Even though this is Karin Slaughter’s 7th installment of her Will Trent series and the reader learns quite a lot about Will Trent’s personal history, there is also quite a bit of Amanda Wagner’s history and the history of women in the Atlanta police department 4o years ago.  Criminal begins with Will Trent in love and beginning to put his past behind him.  Then a college student goes missing and inexplicably, deputy director Amanda Wagner keeps Will Trent off the case.  Criminal alternates between the Seventies,  when Amanda Wagner is new to the Atlanta Police Department and one of her first big cases is a brutal murder in a bad area of Atlanta and the present day as Will struggles to uncover the truth about his past.  Amanda, together with her partner Evelyn finally solve the case and put Will’s father in jail-burying all the information in order to protect Will.  Secrets have a way of coming out and that’s what happens in Criminal.  A good mystery and interesting glimpse into what it was like for women in the be one of the trailblazing women in a male dominated work environment.