Never Knowing

Finished August 2
Never Knowing by Chevy Stevens, performed by Carrington MacDuffle
This is the second book by Stevens. Her first, Still Missing, is a finalist for the OLA Evergreen Award.
This novel uses the same device as her first, sessions at a therapist. I don't think it works as well for this one. There was one instance where I felt the contents of the session seemed like they came after the session. I can't say I liked the reader for this either. To me, the way she read it gave the main character, Sara Gallagher, a tone (put-upon, whiny) that I didn't like, and I don't think the author intended. It made her less sympathetic. But enough about what I didn't like.
The story was great. Sara is an adopted child who has felt that she was treated different from her siblings and always fantasized about her real parents, particularly her father as she always felt unloved by her adopted father. Now she is in her thirties and about to get married to a wonderful man and has a daughter she loves. She thinks she is ready to find out who her birth parents were. She researches and finds her birth mother who rejects her out of hand. As she struggles with this, she discovers that her mother was the only survivor of a violent serial killer, one who has never been caught. Which means that her birth father is a serial killer.
The rest of the book follows Sara's struggle to come to terms with this and what she feels she may have "inherited" from her father. It also shows her struggle with the publicity around it, that may have put her and her family in danger. Pageturning action abounds. And, Stevens gives us the occasional extra little twist just when we relax our guard. Highly recommended.