School Library Journal Review
There's a lot of plot crammed into this series launch. When Charlotte was a baby, her mother was killed by a serial killer couple, who took Charlotte in until their capture seven years later. Now a young woman, Charlotte lives alone in the Arizona desert and trusts few people, including her therapist. When the drug he gives her for her anxiety turns out to be not quite what she expected, her carefully cloistered life falls apart quickly and puts her in the path of a serial killer. Though many of the topics seem extremely gory, most of the violence is psychological and largely off the page. Suspension of disbelief is required in this hybrid thriller/science fiction novel, but it is not hard to imagine it being turned into a high-budget action movie. The combination of Firestarter, The Silence of the Lambs, and the Elizabeth Smart story finally gels at the conclusion, while setting the stage for more. VERDICT This could be a secondary choice for fans of Stephen King or thriller series or for readers who don't mind suspense laced with a hint of science fiction.-Jamie Watson, Baltimore County Public Library © Copyright 2018. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Publisher's Weekly Review
Charlotte Rowe, the harried heroine of this ambitious paranormal thriller and series launch from Rice (The Heavens Rise), used to be Trina Pierce. When she was nine months old, she was abducted by serial killers Daniel and Abigail Banning, who killed her mother. The Bannings raised Trina as their own until, after seven years, they were apprehended. Trina was sent to live with her father, who exploited her by profiting from movies based on her ordeal that portray her as a killer. Trina eventually escaped her father and established a new identity. She now lives in a remote house outside Scarlet, Ariz., with massive security, fearful of stalkers. Meanwhile, her psychiatrist, keen to use her for research, tricks her into taking a drug that gives her superhuman strength. How Charlotte uses these powers and what she does to try to prove that she isn't evil keep the pages turning. Rice makes the most of an interesting conceit, but he could have done so just as effectively at shorter length. Agent: Lynn Nesbit, Janklow & Nesbit. (Mar.) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.
Booklist Review
*Starred Review* A stellar and gripping opening to the Burning Girl series introduces the tough, smart Trina Pierce, aka Charlotte Rowe, who survived a childhood of murder and exploitation to discover there might be another way to fight back. After serial killers murder her mother, they take Charlotte in and raise her in their worldview. Luckily, she is rescued before she actually kills anyone. Her father then writes books about her, which are then made into movies, and he pushes her into the spotlight. Charlotte breaks free of her father and finds some peace with her grandmother, but after her grandmother dies, Charlotte seeks a new life where no one knows about her past. Her one friend in this new life talks her into trying a pill to help ease her anxiety; instead, the pill takes her fear and desire for survival and turns it into brute strength. The creator of the pill sees it as the answer to the problems of domestic abuse, assault, and rape, and that Charlotte is particularly suited to test it. Readers will be eager for the next installment in Rice's (Ramses the Dead, with Anne Rice, 2017) science-fiction take on The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (2008).--Whitmore, Emily Copyright 2018 Booklist
