Her Darkest Secret by Jessica R. Patch Book Club Discussion Questions
Chrisitan Book Club Pick for Suspense & Psychological Thriller
What’s it about?
In Her Darkest Secret by Jessica R. Patch, we follow agent Fiona Kelley and the FBI Strange Crimes Unit as they track down a serial killer who stages his victims based upon nursery rhymes that reveals their darkest secrets.
This isn’t an ordinary case for Fiona because she was one of “Rhyme’s” first abducted victims - but he let her go. For years, she has been tracking him as he kills time and again. But Rhyme is also watching her and commits a crime that brings her back home where it all began.
Fiona must aid her ex-husband, Asa Kodiak, as the leader of his unit if she wants to be a part of solving this case. Asa is a newly converted Christian and isn’t the same man Fiona knew when she last saw him.
Fiona must wrestle with the secrets of her past and the struggles with her faith in order to bring Rhyme to justice.
Not a Book for the Faint of Heart
This suspenseful thriller is full of twists and turns that will grip you to its pages. I read it in three days! However, it deals with a lot of dark themes like child predators, sexual assualt and truly heinous crimes. This book actually scared me at times!
With that being said, this book isn’t for the faint of heart. If you struggle with fear of anxiety, I wouldn’t recommend this for you. A few of our book club members opted out of this one because of some of the content and that is okay!
Light in the Darkness
Although this book deals with dark themes, light is present throughout. Sin and evil exist in this world in jarring extremes. I’m glad that Jessica R. Patch tackled a story that faces these ideas head on with faith at the helm. She didn’t cross any inappropriate lines in her story while not shying away from the harsh realities of a fallen world.
Her Darkest Secret asks the ultimate question, “How do we believe in a good God when bad things happen in the world?” I love the responses of her characters and seeing them wrestle with real difficulties in very human ways.
What I loved about Her Darkest Secret
The GRIPPING storyline
The psychological aspects like Dissociative Identity Disorder (DID) and seeing a character who is an excellent criminal profiler
Examples of REAL Christianity - unanswered prayers, wrestling with belief, struggling to control anger even though you’re a Christian
It faced church problems head on - leaders in churches that abuse members, parents who use religion to control their children, church members not being what they appear to be
Book Club Discussion Questions
Her Darkest Secret was the perfect Book Club Pick! It had so many great themes for discussion.
I created a free printable book club discussion guide with the questions we used at our own book club.
I highly recommend reading this with your own book club or small group!
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Practicing the Way by John Mark Comer Book Club Discussion Questions
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