Killer Instinct by S. E. Green (review)

Lane is a bright, focused sixteen-year-old with plans to go to UVA and major in biology. She has neither the time nor the talent for emotional entanglements, but that doesn’t mean she doesn’t have mischievous, perhaps even unnatural, desires. Since she was ten, she’s been keeping a serial killer scrapbook, and she knows it’s just a matter of time before the pressure to act out her own violent fantasies overtakes her. She has decided that her targets must be people who deserve but have escaped retributive justice under the law, and she starts a career as an avenging angel, torturing but stopping short of killing her victims. When a decapitated head is discovered that may be linked to one of the serial killers she’s been following, Lane garners details about the case via her mother and stepfather (who work for the FBI), but she’s taken by surprise when the killer contacts her directly. Meanwhile, there is a boy who finds her quirky directness attractive, and she finds him fascinating enough to get the whole virginity thing over with. Lane is appealing in her way, with her refusal to play popularity games and her no-nonsense approach to getting the job done, even when that job is gruesome and questionable. Her screwups as she attempts to subdue her victims remind readers as well as herself that she isn’t as smoothly competent or psychotically unfeeling as a polished adult serial killer, and the novel’s ultimate reveal validates the empathy she has evoked all along. Readers who relish a darkly twisted crime drama with a well-managed surprise ending will enjoy curling up with this one.