Breakfall - by Zhanna Slor (Paperback)

Book Synopsis

One wrong decision. One death. One missing person. One clear suspect.

Mina Banksy, a 32-year-old writer and mother of a rambunctious toddler, is still reeling from a tumultuous divorce when two Chicago detectives show up at her door looking for her friend, Dylan. Or, more accurately, the van that she allowed him to register in her name, because Dylan, a friend from her former Jiu Jitsu gym, is a recovered addict and convicted felon. The van quickly becomes the least of her problems, as Dylan, too, is nowhere to be found. His disappearance triggers a series of events that turn everyone at the close-knit gym into suspects or potential victims, and somehow all roads lead back to Mina Banksy, and the scandal that forced her to leave the gym in the first place.

Part unconventional romance and part murder mystery, set inside the eclectic subculture of Brazilian Jiu Jitsu, Breakfall with have you up all night turning the pages until the electric end.

About the Author

Zhanna Slor was born in Ukraine and moved to the Midwest in the early 1990s. Her debut novel, At the End of the World, Turn Left, was called "elegant and authentic" by NPR and named by Booklist as one of the "Top Ten Crime Debuts" of 2021. Her second novel, Breakfall, a domestic thriller surrounding a mysterious death at a close-knit Jiu Jitsu gym, was released in 2023. She currently lives in Milwaukee and works as a TV critic and staff writer for TV Guide.