Gail, her husband Jack, Jennifer her oldest, and Cindy the youngest, were one happy family. Having plenty of wealth, a beautiful home, and all that goes with a richer lifestyle, you wouldn't want for anything more. But perfect doesn't last forever when six-year-old Cindy is raped and murdered. Her killer leaves her under a bush afterwords like a piece of trash. When Gail comes home after an afternoon with her friend to find police there waiting on her, she is very fearful. Of course the minute she learns the news, she is in denial big time, a state of shock, and takes forever to even be able to talk at all. As life continues on, Gail has her mind on one thing only-and that is finding Cindy's killer no matter what. She does very dangerous things; hitchhikes on the streets, and goes to very dangerous parts of town to find the killer. The police just won't work fast enough for her."Life Penalty" was a fairly easy read, although a little far-fetched. Jack was too patient, Jennifer too perfect, and Gail just plain too obsessed. I was pleased to see that the police knew what she was doing and that they weren't portrayed as incompetent, but didn't Jack ever phone home during the day and wonder where his wife was? Didn't Jennifer mention coming home to an empty house to him? I also thought the ending was terrible - I understand why she did what she did and even that it wasn't important to the reader to know what the results of her actions would be, but I thought it unreasonable to expect that the reader would accept the fact that other characters reacted the way they did. I enjoyed the book to the extent that I would read future books by this author, but not enough to give it a ringing endorsment. ( )

What lengths would you go to find your 6 yr. old daughter's killer?
What would you do when you met her killer face to face?
A stay-at-home mother learns that her daughter had been raped and killed while she was visiting and shoppping with a friend. That was a guilt trip in itself. She nearly goes crazy, goes into a deep depression & tries to find the killer herself when she thinks that the police isn't trying hard enough to find him. She almost loses her best friend, her husband and her other daughter. She goes into the sleazy parts of New Jersey, goes into parks at night but to no avail.
All of Fielding's books that I've read are rather slow in the beginning, but they get very suspenseful towards the end. ( )