Everything changed when a newcomer to town became her only best friend, and changed a second time when that friend and another classmate vanished two months later, never to be seen again. At school, a bully made her life a nightmare.

Orphaned at eleven, she was forced to go live with her Bible salesman uncle, wheelchair-bound aunt, and a cousin who tortured and killed small animals. In this gripping suspense debut, the first female sheriff of a small mountain village investigates a disappearance that echoes the crimes that shattered her town decades before.įor twenty-four years, Mary Grace Dobbs has been searching for salvation. “I’m the only one who knows what happened to those girls…”

This startling debut novel introduces a captivating protagonist whose concept of good and evil can shape a young girl-then and now.One of Suspense Magazine's Best Debuts of 2021 Set in a remote mountain town, where the secrets run as deep as the hollows, Saving Grace is at once a spell-binding tale of innocence lost and a twisty, edge-of-your-seat psychological thriller. Racing to find the missing girl while fearing for the safety of her own sixth-grade daughter, Mary Grace must confront an unspeakable truth-and face a decision no parent should ever have to make. The case becomes even more fraught as a cult of white supremacists brings its gospel of hate to Repentance and violence explodes, claiming more lives. With old prejudices and new secrets spilling out into the open, the modern world soon illuminates the village’s darkest corners. Keeping order and her demons at bay becomes an impossible task when the Black drifter suspected in the earlier disappearances returns to Repentance … and another sixth grader vanishes. Today, Mary Grace is the first female sheriff of her rural town, a position that doesn’t sit well with some of the locals.

Saving Grace by Debbie Babitt