S. F. Prescott

Thelma and Louise but make it a love story!

Hannah Deitch is a former SAT tutor with an M.A. in English from UC Irvine, where she studied Marxist theory and contemporary pop culture. A former arts magazine editor, she holds an M.A. in journalism from USC. Her work has appeared in the Los Angeles Times, LA Weekly, and the Los Angeles Review of Books. She currently lives in Los Angeles. Killer Potential is her first novel.

Published March 18th, 2025.

I really enjoyed this thriller! It felt like Thelma and Louise meets The Guest by Emma Cline meets Natural Born Killers. When Evie arrives at the house of her client, she not only stumbles onto a murder scene, but rescues a woman she finds tied up in a secret room.

Both Evie and Jae were likable characters, and I rooted for them until the end. The story gripped me from the start. I was intrigued by Jae’s character, and what she experienced inside the Victors’ home. Her flashbacks later on were fascinating, especially learning about how she ended up inside the walls of the house. The pace was steady, and I enjoyed following along as they drove across state lines causing chaos in order to survive. The author’s voice was compelling and kept me engaged from beginning to end. A great debut! I’m excited to read whatever she publishes next.

For readers who enjoy a fast pace, compelling female characters, and unreliable narrators.

Synopsis:

Destined for greatness, wanted for murder. . .

A scholarship kid with straight As and big dreams, Evie Gordon always thought she was special, that she’d be someone. But after graduating from an elite university, she finds herself drowning in debt and working as an SAT tutor for the super-rich of Los Angeles.

Everything changes one Sunday, when she arrives for her weekly lesson at the Victors’ Beverly Hills estate and, in lieu of a bored teenager, finds the bloody remains of the parents strewn through their beautiful back garden, and a woman crying for help within a closet. As Evie works to free her, the two are spotted—and within moments, they go from bystanders to suspects to fugitives.

Suddenly at the heart of a manhunt and accompanied by a mysterious woman who refuses to speak, Evie knows the only way to clear her name is to find the real killer. But first she’ll have to break down the barriers of her companion, who is quickly becoming the most important person in Evie’s upside-down life. Their breathless spree takes them across the U.S. as developments in the case shock the nation and the press runs wild with Evie’s story: a gifted kid turned killer. She’s now on the cover of every magazine and newspaper—anointed the new Charles Manson, a bloodthirsty ninety-nine percenter looking to start a class war. Evie is finally someone.