When psychiatrist Carter Lane inherits his best friend’s cases after his suicide, he’s thrown into the fractured world of Arthur Frampton: a patient with dissociative identity disorder whose presence triggers memories of a long-buried massacre known as the Hoffman Horror. When Lane's wife is murdered, he discovers that her death mirrors the gruesome details of the decades-old crime. Lane is convinced one of Frampton’s “alters” is responsible, but the detectives on the case have a different theory: Lane himself had motive and opportunity to commit the crime. Now a man on the run, Lane races against time to clear his name while navigating a maze of false identities and repressed trauma. As the pieces fall into place, will redemption cost him everything? A relentless psychological thriller, William J. Cook's PERSONA explores the power of identity - and how the past never truly stays buried. "I wanted to reach out after learning about Persona to tell you how gripping and intelligently constructed this psychological thriller is... Carter Lane is a compelling protagonist because he's so vulnerable...As Lane becomes a man on the run, the novel sharpens into something more than a thriller; it becomes an examination of how easily identity fractures under guilt, grief, and fear...I'm a fellow author who deeply appreciates psychological thrillers that respect both the intelligence and emotional endurance of the reader. Persona is relentless without being hollow, dark without being exploitative, and thoughtful without losing momentum. Congratulations on writing a novel that proves the past doesn't need to be supernatural to be terrifying, it only needs to be buried."-- William Miller, best-selling author of the Jake Noble Military Thriller Series "Great thrillers do one thing better than mediocre ones: they never carelessly reveal answers but instead take readers through a series of scenarios with whiplash turns and twists that keep them guessing until the very end. Cook is skilled at doing just that. He creates well-rounded characters who drive the narrative through believable dialogue...Cook takes the best elements of the psychological thriller and weaves an exciting, intriguing tale. This one will have readers eagerly turning the pages to discover who or what is the real boogeyman in the story. The answer may surprise them."-- Kat Kennedy, The US Review of Books "William J. Cook is as skilled at depicting psychological trauma and the peculiar traits of the dissociative personality as he is in building the exquisite tension of a murder mystery that delves deeply into questions of operating on the wrong side of the law and building a case that has too many loopholes...The personal insights that permeate this story sizzle with reflective force, creating a satisfying 'you are here' feel connecting readers with the puzzles and events that unfold...Its intrigue...translates to engrossing reading that successfully marries the action of a thriller with the psychological revelations of a story nicely steeped in twists, turns, and unexpected revelations."-- D. Donovan, Sr. Reviewer, Midwest Book Review "A haunting, intelligent, slow-burning thriller that explores memory, trauma, and identity...The story repeatedly asks whether the authority of psychiatric knowledge truly grants mastery over the mind, or whether the self is always more unstable than reason would prefer to admit. Cook's precise prose mirrors the language of psychiatry while probing deeper questions of identity. The title Persona--from the Latin for theatrical mask--reflects the novel's central theme: the self we show the world often conceals more than it reveals. The novel utimately succeeds both as a thriller and a meditation on responsibility, identity, and the uneasy boundaries of the human mind."-- The Prairies Book Review