Table of Contents
Originally Published in Nov 2014 REvised and Updated Feb 2026
So last week I wrote that I was struggling through The Stranger You Seek the first of the Keye Street novels from Amanda Kyle Williams. Tonight I went to the library to get book 2 in the series Stranger in the Room!
It’s easy to explain the reason , stealing and editing a line from Monty Python and the Holy Grail “It Got Better!!
I guess that it took a while for the story to grab me, but once it did it didn’t let go until the last twist and turn in the plot!
About The Stranger You Seek – Keye Street #1
The protagonist of the book is Keye Street, an ex-FBI profiler who was a rising star in the agency, until her alcohol addiction brought her career crashing down.
Now Keye is a working PI in Atlanta chasing down bail jumpers, catching adulterers, serving subpoenas, that is until her best friend Atlanta Police Detective Aaron Rauser calls her to help him out on a grisly murder case.
The case’s profile quickly rises soon turning into a hunt, for the “Wishbone” killer. As the killer taunts Rauser and Street, the hunt turns personal, with Keye and Rauser in the killer’s crosshairs.
My Minor Problems Are Overcome
Now, back to the problems that I see as minor and were overcome by the storyline. Elizabeth B. in her review at Goodreads didn’t see it that way though… she wrote……
… The main character was just the most annoying narrator ever. It was as if every problem a person could have was built in by the author. Flawed is one thing but you pretty easily degenerate into Mary Sue-ish and that’s exactly what happened here. Freakish name? Check. Bad family history? Check. Discrimination from childhood? Check. Drugs and/or alcohol abuse? Check. But I’m a survivor and will overcome everything all by my lonesome? Check. Read More At Goodreads
I really didn’t think it was that bad and by the end of the book, I liked Keye and Rauser, and saw them as a team that I could root for!
Final Thoughts
Bottom line: A strong twisting ending made the book a good read and a series that I will follow at least into the next book Stranger in the Room. so Check it Out!
Grade: B – over the first half of the book, A for the last so I guess that’s a B+!!
Post 2026 Additions
Soon after reading The Stranger You Seek I read book # 2 in the series The Stranger in the Room -. You can check out that post here
Recognition for Amanda Kyle Williams
Both The Stranger You Seek] and The Stranger in the Room have appeared on annual best-of lists. Publishers Weekly called The Stranger You Seek “an explosive, unpredictable, and psychologically complex thriller that turns crime fiction clichés inside out.” Her novels have been translated into nine languages.
In 1992 The Providence File was nominated for Best Mystery at the 4th Annual Lambda Literary Awards.[
In 2012 The Stranger You Seek was shortlisted for the Townsend Prize for Fiction.[ The following year, the book was shortlisted for the Private Eye Writers of America’s Shamus Award
Amanda Kyle Williams Book Series
Keye Street/Stranger series
- The Stranger You Seek (2011)
- Stranger in the Room (2012)
- Don’t Talk to Strangers (2014)
Madison McGuire series
- Club Twelve (1990)
- The Providence File (1991)
- A Singular Spy (1992)
- The Spy in Question (1993)
Tragically Amanda Kyle Williams shortly after finishing Don’t Talk to Strangers in 2014 she was diagnosed with cancer. She passed away in 2018.
When I finished Stranger in the Room I had conversation with Amanda either on Facebook through a comment she left on my blog. I told her get on the stick and finish that third book – Her comment was short and sweet – Aye Aye Sir! I feel badly that I didn’t know she had died until a few years after she passed. When I went to look if she had written any new books.
Maybe it’s time to find those Madison McGuire books.
