Mary Ann Grossman with the St. Paul Pioneer Press reviewed “Trafficking U“ on Sunday, Jan. 12, 2025. In case the Pioneer Press link goes bad, here is a PDF.
“Jesse chuckled. Inventing Brooke’s backstory was almost as fun as playing Teena Fay from Green Bay. Almost. But the creeps she was after this time were nastier, closer to home, and more dangerous than the worst credit-card hustlers on the planet.” — from “Trafficking U”
Jesse is a bank fraud investigator sipping coffee at her friend’s coffee shop when a terrified young woman rushes to her table pretending she knows Jesse. She is Leilani and this encounter sets off a chain of events in Jesse’s life that lead her to uncover a vast network of sex traffickers, beginning with her discovery of a strange partnership between her bank and a private college that offers young women a work-study program at a remote resort in northern Minnesota. Jesse is fired when she brings this to the attention of top management at her bank, but she keeps digging, learning of women who have been groomed to work at the resort as prostitutes. This is a story in which nobody can be trusted. Interspersed with the contemporary story are Jesse’s memories of being a teenage thief and seller of fake IDs. There’s a lot going on here: a computer nerd who’s Jesse’s ally, murders, attacks on Jesse and her friends, and a scummy couple who pick out which young woman they will groom, especially those having trouble at home. There’s also a fair amount of computer lingo that will interest IT folks. Although the book is described as a Christian novel, the religious theme is subtle. Kirkus Reviews described the novel as “a diverting thriller with thoughtful commentary on a timely issue.”
The author wrote for an IT industry publication and was a pioneer in finding online groomers. He earned an MBA from the University of St. Thomas.
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