By Sydney Schabacker
Staff Writer

Cassandra Hobbes has a special talent: she is a natural profiler. It’s a talent that her mother, who made a living pretending to be a psychic, helped Cassie develop.

With one look, Cassie can discern more about a person than detailed studies could provide.  She notices the little things- all of them. Though she lost her mother to a brutal unsolved murder, she continues to develop her skill. When the FBI offers Cassie a chance to become part of a secret program that uses gifted teenagers to solve cold cases, she accepts with the hope that she may resolve at least some of the questions surrounding her mother’s murder. The rest of the Naturals, those perhaps too gifted to get along with anyone, make an uneasy alliance as it becomes clear that their work on cold cases triggered a current threat to themselves.

With an excellent cast of characters making up the Naturals including teenage experts in data compilation, lie detection, body language, facial expressions and more, the Naturals’ chapters should hook you in. If not, then the alternating chapters written from the point of view of the killer, known as ‘You,’ should do the trick.

Published in 2013, The Naturals by Jennifer Lynn Barnes is only the first in its series. With advanced degrees in psychology, psychiatry and cognitive science, Barnes is very well suited for writing criminal suspense novels.  The second in The Naturals series is Killer Instinct. Based on how much I enjoyed The Naturals, I will definitely be reading Killer Instinct.