People keep dying around Ruby Simon, but she insists that doesn't mean she's always guilty. Should we take a confessed killer at her word? Readers horrified by the opening scene, in which 5-year-old Ruby murders her 7-year-old schoolmate Duncan Reese, will soon be assured that it wasn't such a bad thing after all. Duncan was spoiled and mean and bullied Ruby's sister, so her actions were excusable, if not heroic--at least in her eyes. The same can later be said of her friend's predatory father and an awful therapy client nicknamed "the Witch," both of whom meet their unfortunate demises with Ruby's assistance. When Ruby's husband dies, however, she insists she had nothing to do with it. Detective Keith Jackson disagrees, and he's determined to find out why bodies keep piling up around Ruby. They face off, each attempting to outsmart the other, while Ruby regales readers with her side of the story. Sprinkled throughout are clues suggesting Ruby may not be the empathetic vigilante she pretends to be. "I waited for guilt to set in. But it never did," she says about the first murder. In college, she majors in psychology hoping for some insight into her own behavior, and when she meets her monstrously narcissistic future mother-in-law, she wonders if perhaps they're a little too much alike. Rothchild gives readers an unreliable narrator who truly lives up to the moniker. Is Ruby a sociopath or isn't she? Was Jason's death an accident, or did someone murder him? The answers are anything but straightforward. A compelling and entertaining psychological thriller. Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

Ruby Simon has a secret. On the outside, she's a happily married Yale graduate, a successful psychologist, and an animal lover. On the inside, she's a serial killer. Of course, her victims were all detestable, maybe even dangerous; if Ruby only kills degenerates, she can't possibly be one herself. When her husband dies, however, Ruby's proximity to so much death is finally called into question. Will a tragic accident finally reveal her true nature? In her fiction debut, Rothchild has cleverly constructed a protagonist that is equal parts sympathetic and cold. Narrator Allyson Ryan's impassive, almost annoyed, tone is such a stark contrast to the compelling story that it serves to unsettle listeners almost as much as the murders themselves. Through this first-person point of view, Ryan becomes Ruby herself, nonchalantly recounting her criminal past. Short chapters with cliffhanger endings enhance the suspenseful tone and shocking twists. VERDICT This audio will appeal to listeners seeking a psychological thriller with an amiable yet amoral protagonist. Recommended for fans of Greer Hendricks, Gilly Macmillan, and Michele Campbell.--Lauren Hackert

Ruby Simon is the kind of character who lures readers into and then through a story, eliciting our amateur psychological diagnoses, stealing our breath with her cunning, and sparking serious guilt for having rooted for her even a little bit. Ruby is a dedicated psychologist who began studying trauma effects at a precocious six years old after she drowned her sister's pint-size bully. Ruby isn't a willy-nilly killer; she played by the rules for years, until her best friend's father tempted her to engineer another apparent accident. She garners only sympathy for her proximity to these tragedies until her husband, Jason, a Type 1 diabetic, dies in his sleep. Jason's death catches the attention of an astute Miami PD detective, and Ruby is confronted with the improbability of so many accidental deaths in her sphere. Ruby's college best friend, Nathan, now a star defense attorney, pulls out all the stops when she's charged with Jason's murder. Can she keep her true nature under wraps? This whip-smart, well-constructed debut makes Rothchild a thriller writer to watch carefully.

Rothchild (How to Get Divorced by 30) makes her fiction debut with a mesmerizing thriller. At age five, Ruby Simon holds seven-year-old Duncan Reese underwater in the Atlantic Ocean until he drowns, an act that to her surprise she doesn't feel guilty about. Flash forward 25 years. In a Miami Beach PD interrogation room, Det. Keith Jackson confronts Simon with photos of four murder victims, including Reese. Simon says she killed Reese because he had bullied her beloved older sister, and she decided that drowning him was her only effective option. Simon recalls the circumstances of two other killings before Jackson gets to the crime Simon has been arrested for, her husband's murder. Rothchild does a terrific job keeping readers wondering about Simon's reliability, and pulls off the considerable challenge of engendering sympathy for an unrepentant killer. Vivid prose is another plus--Simon refers to her mother and father as submarine, rather than helicopter, parents because they were "a giant lumbering presence, but too often unseen and too deep to be accessible." Jeff Lindsay fans will have a hard time not devouring this standout effort in one sitting. Agent: Jess Regel, Helm Literary. (Apr.)