Book Review: "If You Know Her" by Shiloh Walker

If You Know Her by Shiloh Walker
My rating: 5 of 5 stars

BACK COVER: "A SHADOW IN THE WINDOW

Nia Hollister doesn’t scare easily. She’s returned to Ash, Kentucky, with a vengeance—and with a mission: find the killer who brutally ended her cousin’s life. What she didn’t count on was trembling with desire every time she sees Law Reilly. If any man can help her escape the nightmares for a while, it’s him. But can she allow herself to take comfort in those strong arms when her sister’s killer still roams free?

She may think she’s a bad ass, but she should not have come back to his town. He is watching her—as she slips into Law Reilly’s house, as she storms into the sheriff’s office. These men won’t be able to protect her when her time comes. Timing is everything, though he can’t wait forever. She’s nosing around the woods, looking for his hiding place. Yes, he is watching her . . . through the window . . . in her bed . . .

If she’s not scared, she should be . . . because he is very good at what he does."


Shiloh Walker’s “If You Know Her” is part three of a series but the first of her books I’ve read. It won’t be the last. Despite not reading the first two, I had very little trouble catching up with the story and figuring out who was who in the fictional town of Ash where the series is situated.

I read of A LOT of series books from Julie Miller’s Taylor Clan/Precinct and the HQN Fortune Children (and the relative subseries of both) to the Fitzgerald Bay mini-series and Camy Tang’s Deadly Intent series. With series (and others) I tend to find the authors either lean toward providing a lot of background information about the previous books so a new reader to the series doesn’t get lost or providing just the barebone information on the previous books to entice the new reader to look for those books as well. Either way the run the risk of alienating returning readers by boring them with information they already know or of confusing the new readers by not giving clear enough background.

Ms. Walker didn’t fall into either of those categories. Throughout the first couple of scenes she dropped in little tidbits of information regarding the previous books and characters so that it was almost undetectable.

First Nia couldn’t sleep because she was thinking of her dead cousin and how she just couldn’t accept that her murderer had been found. It hinted at a previous run in with Law so the tension would obviously be there.Something was still nagging her. The writing here is so good, the anxiety level so palatable, I want to reach for a cigarette with Nia and I don’t smoke! LOL

Then in the very next scene, you find out she’s right. While it’s told from the killer’s point of view, Ms. Walker doesn’t reveal who the killer is just yet. Still it shows that the killer is just as antsy as Nia about her cousin’s murder. He knows some other guy took the fall for her sister’s murder but he still wants to get out there. The need to kill is still there but if he does locally he’ll be discovered and he can’t let that happen but Nia just won’t let up. The more she seeks out answers the more the killer fixates on her, intent to make her one of his victims.

The suspense throughout the novel kept me hooked until the end. Maybe if I’d read the other two in the series, I might have picked up on the killer earlier but the reveal was so expertly written I can’t complain. Ms. Walker is a fabulous author and her stories are well worth the money spent.

Now before you think this review is all wine and roses, I have to admit there was one point in the story I put the book down and almost didn’t pick it back up again.

About midway or two-thirds of the way through the book, Law and Nia come across the killer’s lair. Grisly images. Photos of the victims. Everything you’d imagine you’d find in a sick and sadistic torture room of a serial killer. Law, of course, being the chivalrous hero tries to shield Nia from the images but her stubborn streak won’t let her be coddled and she sneaks a peak as soon as Law’s out of the room.


For any person, images like that are almost as torturous to the viewer as it was to the person in the picture. When it is someone you know, it makes it even harder. My initial problem here was instead of lashing out, crying until no more tears could come, etc., Law and Nia have sex.

Yup. Steamy, no holds barred, hotter than lava sex.

At the time, it was a total turnoff for me. How could they be even thinking of sex when they’d just seen what they saw? I didn’t get it. I’m not a prude or anything but lost interest in what happened after that. Sex is fine. Even a lot of sex is fine. But the sex has to mean something. A growing connection between the characters. A development in the relationship.

Well, even though I’d put the book on the shelf and planned to donate it the next time I took a bag of books to the library, the story just wouldn’t let go of me. And one night watching a rerun of the TV series “Criminal Minds”, a lightbulb went off in my head.

I don’t remember the exact words but essentially the character said something along the lines that each member of the BAU team had something to help them escape the horror of what they see everyday. Something that helps them reconnect with humanity. Baseball. A butterfly collection. Family.

That’s when it hit me. The sex between Law and Nia wasn’t just sex. It was a reconnection. A need to feel something other than pain and grief. Because of their established deep attraction to each other, the sex was intense and hot but the emotional balance obtained by connecting with another human being made it so much more.

With that in mind, I went back to the book and read that section and came out of it feeling much better about their physical relationship as well as their long term prospects. That connection with each other made them much more believable, in my opinion, as being able to have a fulfilling relationship after the end of the book.

So, while I had a hiccup or two with reading the book, overall Ms. Walker did a fabulous job at providing the suspense, tension and romance needed for this story. I would definitely consider her a must read.

For more on Ms. Walker as well as her extensive booklist, please visit http://www.shilohwalker.com/
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