Rick Bentz wakes up in the hospital smelling his dead wife’s perfume, the scent of gardenias. And she is standing in the hospital room door blowing a kiss at him. How is this possible? What is going on with his reality?

When more unaccountable events continue to happen, including the murders of people who knew his late wife Jennifer, Rick Bentz starts to investigate and ends up becoming the link between the murders and the prime suspect.

Lisa Jackson is a writer with the ability to not just grab and keep a reader, but also the ability to make the reader go back again and again for a larger taste of her worlds and her characters. However, that said – and I am a reader who loves Ms. Jackson’s books – Malice fell short of her usual style. Was it a good book? Yes. Was it as good as I expected from Ms. Jackson? No. Malice is a well-drawn thriller with plenty of twists and turns. I second-guessed myself on who the killer was, which did make it more enjoyable for me. That said, where Malice fell short for me was in a detail that links Malice with previous books of Ms. Jackson’s. Specifically, her characters have become like family to me and I felt let down that Rick and Olivia, his current love, were treated the way they were in this book. Malice can be read as a standalone but the series is better read in order.