The Janes by Louisa Luna

Published by Doubleday on January 21, 2020

The Janes is the second Alice Vega novel, following Two Girls Down. Both books are a fresh take on the concept of a private investigator who tracks down missing children. While most protagonists who track down missing kids are ridiculously self-aggrandizing, reminding everyone they meet how much they care about victims, Vega cares about being paid. Yeah, she cares about the kids too, but she doesn’t talk about it. In fact, she doesn’t talk about much of anything. Unlike thriller heroes who can’t stop talking about themselves or recalling their difficult childhoods or berating others for not caring enough about victims, Vega keeps her mouth shut and gets the job done. Vega is not loquacious; she lets her actions speak.

The title refer to two Jane Does, two female children who have been killed and dumped. A piece of paper with Alice Vega’s name is clutched in the hand of one of the dead girls. We learn in an early scene that Spanish-speaking girls are being held for sex work in a “television room.” If a month goes by when no customer picks them, or if customers complain about their performance, they are taken to the garage by a fellow named Rafa, where something bad will happen. Vega has been in the news thanks to her child rescue efforts, which is how the girls in the television room know about her.

The girls are wearing IUDs with serial numbers that are only five numbers apart. Vega assumes there are at least four more girls where these two game from. A couple of police officers hire Vega to track down the girls. To that end, Vega doubles the proposed fee so she can use half to pay her friend, Max Caplan.

Cap is a retired cop with a potentially lucrative and easy job awaiting him. He’s not sure he wants to take on another adventure with Vega, who has a tendency to place him in dangerous situations. His daughter is even less certain that he should be risking his life. But Cap has a thing for Vega, who played him in Two Girls Down with a kiss he can’t forget. Whether she has any actual feelings for Cap won’t be clear until the novel ends.

Vega goes about her business efficiently, without ever talking about herself or her worldview. I love that about her. She wasn’t trained in the military or by a martial arts expert. She’s fairly small and doesn’t rely on superior fighting techniques when she places herself in danger, as she regularly does. If she needs to overcome a larger foe, she hits them in the knee with a bolt cutter. Or she shoots them in a nonlethal location. I love the fact Louisa Luna doesn’t make her protagonist a superhero. Cap is a bit more philosophical, and certainly the more demonstrative of the two, which makes him a good counterpoint.

I’m not typically a fan of human trafficking stories (thriller writers love to imagine there is human trafficking everywhere, but in reality, it’s pretty rare in the US). This story won me over because of the intriguing twists it takes, as Vega investigates corruption and an off-the-books approach to immigrant detention in various police and government agencies. The plot is credibly low-key and all the more fascinating because of it. The Alice Vega series establishes Louisa Luna as a thriller writer worth following.

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