Twelve-year-old Emily was a good girl from a good family in rural Georgia before the day the two men came. The only survivor of the notorious Calby Murders, she ran away and went missing. Ex-gang member Lucas Jackson took her in off the streets and became her family. He taught her a lot, including how to survive—and kill. Justice. Always comes too late, but it’s still justice. His words became Emily’s raison d’être.
The Emily Calby Series tracks Emily’s perilous life and remarkable journey forward from the day of the home invasion to her graduation from law school and opening of her own law firm. The four titles are spaced four years apart in Emily’s life: The Hiding Girl (age 12); The Girl in Cell 49B (age 16); Target: The Girl (age 20); The Girl Goes Home (age 24). The books can be read together or as standalones. Each title involves a distinct plot, setting, and new characters.
Emily’s story is a twisty, action-packed coming-of-age journey guaranteed to be like no other, both heartbreaking and heartwarming. It will leave you cheering, cringing, crying, and even laughing. Dark and gritty, but filled with hope and humor, it’s a testament to the boundlessness of human love, loyalty, and the will to survive.
At one time or another, entries in The Emily Calby Series have been the No. 1 Bestseller on Amazon in categories such as Thrillers, Psychological Thrillers, Legal Thrillers, and Women Sleuths..
Awards for The Emily Calby Series
— Best Psychological Thriller of the Year (BestThrillers.com)
— Publishers Weekly BookLife Prize Semifinalist
— 2021 Indiereader Discovery Award For Fiction
— Feathered Quill Medal for Mystery/Suspense
— Readers’ Favorite Awards in both Suspense and New Adult Fiction
— National Indie Excellence Award Finalist
— Finalist, Best Legal Thriller of the Year (BestThrillers.com)
The Hiding Girl (Emily Calby Book 1)
Twelve-year-old Emily Calby was a good girl from a religious family in rural Georgia. She loved softball, her little sister and looking up words to get her allowance. Then two men came and murdered her family. Only the killers know she survived.
On the run, surviving by wits and animal instinct, she makes an unlikely ally in an ex-gang member who lost his own family to violence. He takes her in and trains her in “self-defense” before more tragedy launches her on a terrifying journey for justice. Nothing will stop her—not cops or creeps, not even her own splintering mind. Through it all, Emily fights to hold onto hope and the girl she once knew, kept buried deep inside.
Dark and gritty, but filled with heart and hope, The Hiding Girl is a twisty, fast-paced thriller and a testament to the boundless limits of human love, sacrifice and the will to survive.
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The Girl in Cell 49B (Emily Calby Book 2)
Emily Calby disappeared at age twelve, the only survivor of a notorious home invasion. Three years after her terrifying odyssey in The Hiding Girl, she’s safe, living in anonymity with her mentor, ex-gang member Lucas Jackson—before life blows up again on her Sweet Sixteen birthday. Arrested for carrying her birthday gift (an illegal handgun), a fingerprint scan shows her to be the “missing Calby girl” and worse: she’s wanted for murder in another state.
Extradited to a corrupt juvenile prison, Emily struggles to adjust to a new code of survival while battling a vindictive prosecutor willing to resort to any means to convict her. As The Law thwarts her every move, she begins to appreciate its awesome power. She discovers an unused prison law library and buries herself in the books, casting her destiny.
As she fights for her life in court, the dark secrets behind the prison walls close in. Her cellmate, a spookily prescient drug addict, is in grave danger. So is her first love, a gentle boy sentenced to life without parole. Emily’s desperate to help them, but how can she, when her explosive trial brings one new disaster after another? A courtroom thriller like no other.
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Target: The Girl (Emily Calby Book 3)
Emily Calby’s destiny as a justice seeker was cast at age twelve when two men invaded her rural Georgia home and murdered her family. The only survivor, she ran away and went missing. Ex-gang member Lucas Jackson took her in off the streets and became her family. He taught her a lot, including how to survive—and kill. Arrested for murder at sixteen, Emily discovered a different path to justice in a prison library. The Law.
Now she’s twenty and excited to start law school in sunny Florida. One problem. She’s being stalked. Or is she? Deeply traumatized by her past, she lives in a state of hypervigilance where the ordinary seems ominous. A moved houseplant. An anonymous welcome note. A broken starfish. They’re nothing … but still.
Determined to be the warrior and survivor Lucas taught her to be, she suffers in secret while struggling to navigate the rites and rigors of law school, where trouble follows her every move. From a budding romance that’s not what it seems to a legendary professor in need of help—and Justice.
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The Girl Goes Home (Emily Calby Book 4)
The last time Emily Calby was in Dilfer County, Georgia, she was twelve years old, climbing out a window and running for her life, the only survivor of the famous Calby Murders. She went missing and never returned, shut out even thinking of her life in Georgia. Now twenty-four, she’s a law school graduate opening her own firm in Memphis, excited about a new start.
But the past never lets go. Back in Dilfer County, a hidden envelope found in the file cabinet of a dying lawyer cracks open a fifty-year-old vault of treachery surrounding her father. He died in a farm accident a year before the home invasion. Or did he?
She returns to investigate, haunted by the ghosts of her childhood. The secrets she uncovers threaten everything she knows about her family, her very existence. As she works to untangle the mystery, powerful forces seek to block her every move. What are they trying to hide? Each puzzle piece escalates the danger, not just to her, but everyone around her, including Meggie Tribet, the best friend she abandoned. In Emily’s fractured psyche, there are no limits to what, or who, she’s willing to sacrifice to protect them.
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PRAISE FOR THE EMILY CALBY SERIES
“Dark and gritty … an exceptional, heart-pounding story full of raw emotion, deep-seated fear, and an undercurrent of hope and innocence. Deeply atmospheric … without peer in contemporary mysteries/thrillers.” — Publishers Weekly BookLife Prize Semifinalist
“In Emily, Author Dorian Box has created a rarity—a teenage protagonist that is at once sympathetic, vulnerable and largely fearless.” — BestThrillers.com (Best Psychological Thriller of Year)
“The story that author Dorian Box has created for Emily Calby is nothing short of thrilling, but it’s the masterful interplay of character, setting, and theme, along with the fast pace and high emotional stakes that make this a real page-turner.” — IndieReader Discovery Award for Fiction
“A unique mix of hope, shattered innocence, pain, fear, and vulnerability … a great, suspenseful read.” — Readers’ Favorite Medal for Suspense Fiction
“You root for the lead, Emily, and stick with her throughout. Engaged me from the first page. Excellent story. Dark and grisly, yet a lot of hope comes with this one.” — Feathered Quill Medal for Mystery/Suspense
“Most heartwarming bloody crime I’ve ever read … Emily’s story is both heart-wrenching in the tragedies that befall her, as well as heartwarming in the people she meets that help her on her way.” — BookistFirst
“[S]tandout sequel from Dorian Box featuring a fierce female main character, a perfectly planned and paced plot, and a strong sense of theme … Emily is a brilliant character; she is the perfect balance of admirable and flawed. … Every scene is meaningful, which makes the book a true page-turner.” — IndieReader (5 Stars, IR Seal of Approval)
“Once again, I’m floored, breathless, and sleep-deprived from racing through yet another harrowing and heartfelt adventure in the ever-dangerous life of young Emily Calby.” — NetGalley