Its about time someone writes a serial killer book without having to shove the blood and gore in your face. This was scarier with my imagination, though don't get me wrong, there was plenty of inuendo. Also, I appreciate the author not trying to write a 500 page novel by adding hundreds of pages of filler. This author gave a fast paced book without all the "nonsense" so many authors today feel the need to stick in. Just because the book is 500 pages long doesn't make it a great novel. If you are any good as an author, you can accomplish it in 300 pages or less. And if she writes another book about this character, I will definitely read it. I usually love these types of books but lately no one writes a book unless they tell you every single gory detail like I'm watching a B movie on the Syfy channel. Apparently this author gives her reader some credit for intelligence. Great book.

I have read all of Leslie Wolfe's books from Amazon and probably enjoyed this the most although I enjoyed the others also. I thought the first quarter or so of the book moved a little slowly but at some point I couldn't put it down. Very suspenseful. I liked this book better than Ms. Wolfe's other offerings because I found it to be a bit more "realistic" or believable (as believable goes) in terms of the main female character and the overall plot. I also found myself doing less skimming through this book versus the others. I tend to skim over laborious descriptions of various settings or things (like the description or details of a room or what or how characters are eating). For example, far too many references to coffee drinking in the other books - who cares). Overall, very good book and I would recommend it.

4.5 stars

Gosh, another unexpected terrific read for me! I want to thank my Goodreads friend Mike (HornFan2) for steering me to this one. Dawn Girl is written by little known (at the moment) author Leslie Wolfe. I suspect she will not be little known for long.

Protagonist FBI Special Agent Tess Winnett is in trouble at work. She’s is as good as they come in terms of solving whatever case is assigned to her, but she has no people skills, thanks in good part to her untreated PTSD. She garners way more than her share of complaints by disrespecting colleagues, witnesses, politicians, and just about everybody else she comes in contact with. One more major complaint and she will be fired, no matter how phenomenal she is at her job. She is assigned to help out police detectives Gary Michowsky and Todd Fradella of West Palm Beach, Florida, when a young woman is found dead on the beach. Could this be the work of a serial killer? Tess has to try to mesh with these detectives in order to break the case open.
We get snippets of info about the killer as the story moves along. He is a sadistic SOB with extraordinarily high-level skills in terms of carrying out his mission.

I can easily heap a lot of praise on this book. Tess is a complex character who is very well written. We get into her mind a lot. Not all will like her, but I sure did. She is making an effort to change her ways for which I give her credit. I appreciate the attention paid to creating depth in the evolution of Tess’s relationship with the West Palm Beach cops. Another real plus is the highly detailed chapter involving the FBI profiler and his thought processes in determining the psychological profile of the bad guy. We essentially get a step-by-step lesson in how to determine what an unknown baddie is all about. Ditto regarding the chapter devoted to filling in a whiteboard—I found that fascinating. We get a lot of attention to procedure in this police/FBI procedural.

Even in the absence of a prologue, I was pulled into the story immediately. I was riveted all the way to the end. There are plenty of high tension, twists and turns. I felt strongly invested in Tess and her makeshift team. The chapters are short and snappy and the tale flows beautifully.

Why 4.5 stars and not 5? Two reasons. One of the twists I saw coming very early on, but that didn’t bother me much. My main beef was that a portion of the ending is too neat and a bit unrealistic. Other than that, this novel is a total winner. I am rounding up as Dawn Girl had much more of a 5-star rather than a 4-star effect on me.

I strongly recommend Dawn Girl to all thriller/crime fiction fans and readers of psychological suspense. I think followers of Angela Marsons and Robert Bryndza would especially love this book. I have already bought book 2 in the Tess Winnett series (The Watson Girl) and can’t wait to get to it.

Congratulations, Leslie Wolfe for what I believe could be a hit series!

Terrific story about a young woman FBI agent who must battle her own demons in search of a monster who is killing young women. The plot is excellent and keeps the reader involved throughout the book.The two main characters while very different in many ways actually have many commonalities. This book is well worth your time and money.

Leslie Wolfe writes a good thriller, fast paced, not too filled with extraneous material, but I gave her three stars for several reasons: First, when 'Dawn Girl' 's body was first discovered, it was on Palm Beach. Then every time the beach where her body lay was mentioned, it was Juno Beach, which is nearly 20 miles from Palm Beach! Yet, the detectives who worked the case with her were Palm Beach police. Then she's calling them Palm Beach County Police. If they were Palm Beach County cops, they'd be from the Palm Beach County Sheriff's Office, and they wouldn't be working a Palm Beach case. If the body were discovered on Juno Beach, the Juno Beach Police Department would be working it, not the Palm Beach Police Department. Then, in Miami, they don't do as real cops do and go to the police station to get them involved since it was in their back yard; they work it alone without the courtesy of getting the local cops involved. And especially, not to involve local police when they went to get the collar on the maniacal suspect on Biscayne Bay in Miami . As a writer I found this confusing and contradictory, which is a shame, because Wolfe knows how to write a fast paced thriller which holds the reader's attention on the action. I look forward to reading more of her thrillers, as I liked Agent Tess Winnett, flawed because of what the suspect did to her in the past, but a good FBI agent, nonetheless.