From Publishers Weekly
Irish author Black invades Val McDermid territory and comes out a winner in this first mystery set in gritty, moody Dublin. Saxon (we never learn her first name), a former FBI agent turned true-crime writer, has remained in Dublin after her unsuccessful attempt to write a book about Ed Fagan, a vicious, Bible-quoting serial killer who suddenly vanished from Dublin five years earlier. She has a fond relationship with her lover, Detective Chief Superintendent Grace Fitzgerald, but a professional life in limbo. Then newspaper reporter Nick Elliott, who did write a book about Fagan, receives a letter with a threat to kill five prostitutes in the next week. With each murder, the killer taunts the police with enigmatic clues. Grace pulls Saxon into the investigation as an expert on Fagan, but Saxon knows from a secret she can't reveal to Grace that this is a copycat killer. The book becomes a tense balancing act between the police search for Fagan and Saxon's search for the real killer. A string of plausible suspects keeps the reader guessing and the suspense at fever pitch until the breathtaking ending. Black writes with the edginess of Denise Mina, Jenny Siler and the masterful McDermid. On the minus side, the many characters are hard to keep track of, and the use of Britishisms like "whilst" and "opposite to" by Saxon and a fellow American profiler jars. Still, this first book will whet the reader's appetite for a sequel.
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From Booklist
In a genre filled with Bible-quoting, women-hating serial killers who target prostitutes, Black's debut, set in a sharply detailed Ireland, stands out as a refreshing change of pace: its serial killer offers a new twist on psychotic behavior, and its heroine is not just another cop. Called simply "Saxon," the female narrator, an American expat, is a cigar-smoking former FBI agent involved in a love affair with Grace Fitzgerald, chief superintendent of the Dublin police. Saxon's FBI training comes in handy when Ed Fagan, a notorious Dublin serial killer, sends a letter to a local paper saying he is going to kill again--and does. Saxon, who extensively investigated the "Night Hunter," as Fagan was called, is positive that the killer is not a
him. But can she convince the authorities? Black throws in enough red herrings to make the story unpredictable--indeed, the ending is a little too far-fetched--but what makes this one work is the psychology of the killer and the charisma of the heroine, whose combination of sarcasm and smarts will have readers clamoring for more.
Jenny McLarinCopyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved
