She killed a man.
He deserved it.
But justice isn’t done yet.

Welcome to the Emerald Triangle …

California, Southern Humboldt County, 1985.
Renata Drake steps off a Greyhound bus and into small-town Garberville, hoping to disappear. She checks the papers. She’s not headline news. Not yet.

But she’s made a wrong turn. The FBI have the cannabis-producing “Emerald Triangle” town—and its corrupt residents—in their sights. Even worse, a teenage girl is missing, and when she turns up dead, the third in three years, it’s clear a serial killer is living among them.

Renata knows about murdered girls and the burning desire for justice—and for revenge. Her younger sister Josie is gone, and now, so is the man who killed her. Renata didn’t stay in Washington, D.C to be arrested for executing a murderer and she shouldn’t stay here either. But she can’t look away, and she decides to help an investigation … and what she uncovers will trigger a final reckoning: For herself, for a killer, and for all of southern Humboldt.

THE RECKONING is the first of a new thriller series, filled with heart-in-your-mouth suspense, unforgettable characters, Stanley’s characteristically lyrical prose and rich, textured themes. An authentic, haunting story of life in a rural area—one uniquely dependent on an illegal economy—THE RECKONING asks provocative questions about law, justice, ethics, and ultimately, what defines a community.