Perfect Prey by Helen Fields @Helen_Fields @AvonBooksUK @ElkeDesa #PerfectPrey #DILucCallanach #CrimeFiction #BookReview

Avon Books July 2017

Book Description

Welcome to Edinburgh.

Murder Capital of Europe.

In the middle of a rock festival, a charity worker is sliced across the stomach.  He dies minutes later.  In a crowd of thousands, no one saw his attacker.

The following week, the body of a primary school teacher is found in a dumpster, strangled with her own scarf.

D.I. Ava Turner and D.I Luc Callanach have no leads and no motive – until grafitti appears around the city, describing each victim.

It’s only when they realise the words are being written before rather than after the murders, that they understand the killer is announcing his next victim… and the more innocent the better.

A dark and twisted serial killer thriller that fans of Karin Slaughter and M. J. Arlidge won’t be able to put down.

My Thoughts

This is the second book in the D. I. Luc Callanach crime series, set in Edinburgh.  I read the first book Perfect Remains a while back (before starting this blog) but I was convinced then that this was a crime series I was planning to read more of.  That conviction remains!

Perfect Prey sees D. I. Luc Callanach leading his team in another gruesome murder investigation alongside his friend and peer D. I. Ava Turner.  Fans of this series will know there is great chemistry between this pair and rest assured, that shows no signs of letting up.  Luc Callanach is a great leading character, the French Detective arrived in Scotland from Interpol laden with issues and I really do recommend reading this series in order to enable familiarity with the key characters operating out of Police Scotland.

As for the crime itself, well once again Helen Fields has created a piece of fiction that in my opinion encompasses everything crime stories should be.  The crimes are gruesome, but then murder is right?  I am always impressed when authors embrace the grittiness of the genre.  Frankly though this book had me worried, touching on the sinister cyber space that is the dark web, the implications were truly grim.  I’m not going to say anymore about the plot because those who know me will be aware this blog is always spoiler free!

What I will say though is this story is slick, comprehensive and detailed without being difficult to follow.  The Police characters are familiar and engaging and the stories for these cast members are continuing to develop in a positive way.  Written in the third person the book progresses as the crimes emerge, this feels fast paced insofar as there is a killer on the loose waiting to strike!  Throughout the story I was gripped, the words flowed and at no point did this book feel farfetched, instead it always (to my amateur ears) rang true.

Safe to say then that I liked this book, a lot and recommend it highly.  This is great crime fiction, but possibly not for the faint hearted!  As the blurb suggests this is an absolute must for fans of the Helen Grace series by M. J. Arlidge.

This is the second in a series of currently four – for ease the order is –

Perfect  Remains

Perfect Prey

Perfect Death

Perfect Silence

Look out for reviews of Perfect Death and Perfect Silence coming up soon.  Have you read any of these?  Let me know in the comments what you think if you have read them or whether you plan to read this series.

Thanks as always for reading.