A Secret Rage by Charlaine Harris

I must begin by stating that Charlaine Harris is one of my favorite authors.  I first began reading her books after I read the Twilight series.  I was on a bit of a vampire kick, so I picked up the first book in her Sookie Stackhouse series (the series True Blood is based on).  I quickly read through all of the Sookie books that had been released.  She now has 12 Sookie books and the 13th and final book in the series will be released in May.  As I tried to wait patiently for each Sookie book release, I decided to start reading the books in her other series:  Lily Bard, Harper Connelly, and Aurora Teagarden.  I also flew through these in no time.  While the Sookie series is by far my favorite of her 4 series, the Aurora Teagarden books come in at a close second.  I was working on my library science degree at the time and I loved that Aurora is a mystery solving librarian.  

I finally had the chance to meet Charlaine Harris when I went with some friends to the National Book Fest in Washington D.C.  After hearing her talk about all of her books, I decided that I wanted to also read her two standalone books:  A Secret Rage and Sweet and Deadly.  

Synopsis:  
Nicki Callahan is a former New York City model, who has just been informed by her agent that her  services are no longer needed.  Nicki is crushed  that her modeling career has ended at the young age of 27.  She decides to move back home to Knolls, Tennessee to live with her best childhood friend, Mimi, and to finish getting her college degree. As Nicki settles back into life in Knolls, she reconnects with many former acquaintances, including Mimi's brother Cully, her childhood crush. 

Nicki soon discovers that Knolls is not the quiet little town that it use to be when a serial rapist begins attacking the women around town, Nicki included.  The whole town attempts to discover who the rapist is, as the police on the case have determined it is most likely someone they know.  

My thoughts:  
This novel was definitely different from most of the other Charlaine Harris novels I have read.  There are no vampires, werewolves, or supernatural elements.  A Secret Rage is a mystery, but it also deals with the very difficult subject of rape. After reading this book, I discovered that Charlaine Harris is herself a victim of rape.  I imagine this must have been a very difficult subject for her to write about.  While this mystery was a little more difficult for me to read than her others because of the heavy subject, Charlaine handles it very well.  If you are a Charlaine Harris fan, you should definitely add this to your book list.