Blood Angel
The Santero And Rein Thrillers, Book 3
- اطلاعات
- نقد و بررسی
- دیدگاه کاربران
نقد و بررسی
April 13, 2020
Schaffer’s adequate third Santero and Rein thriller (after 2019’s Unsettled Grave) finds the pair on the trail of a sadist. Fifteen years earlier, Jacob Rein, then a Viera County, Pa., police detective, helped stop high schooler Tucker Pennington from torching a classmate, Brenda Drake, he doused with gasoline. Now, before Pennington is released from a secure mental facility, Brenda apparently commits suicide, and Det. Carrie Santero discovers a threatening letter near the body signed by “The Master,” Pennington’s criminal alias. When Pennington’s psychiatrist is later found murdered, Santero decides that she needs now ex-detective Rein’s help. At the crime scene, Rein and Santero note inconsistencies with Pennington’s previous m.o., and agree that a copycat could be at work. Since there’s just one significant alternative to Pennington as the villain, the reveal of the “real” killer won’t surprise many readers. The detectives are clever enough but not particularly distinctive. A fair amount of action, gore, and weird ritual should satisfy most fans of serial killer fiction. Agent: Sharon Pelletier, Dystel, Goderich & Bourret.
April 15, 2020
Cop novels written by cops?Schaffer is a full-time police detective?have one element in common: they don't find the dark side fascinating. It's tedious when it isn't murderous, and there is no Hannibal Lecter. Cannibals "aren't into the opera," says Schaffer's detective Jacob Rein, who is a version of Thomas Harris' Will Graham (Red Dragon, 1981), the supercop whose ability to enter the minds of murderous loons nearly unhinges him. There's a bit of Holmes, too, as when Rein's partner laments having to put up with Rein's genius when he's "between masterpieces." Rein finds all his spooky skills strained when he goes against kill-crazy Tucker Pennington, a young man who uses the Bible as a manual for gruesome murders. The fast-moving narrative is powered by a sleek engine of propulsive writing, and, as it revs up, readers will feel they're inside with the doors locked, and they'll love it. They'll also love blather-free Rein and his existential manifesto: the universe is dying, and there is no God. Has he talked to clerics? Plenty: "They were all child molesters." Hardheaded and uncompromisingly realistic.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2020, American Library Association.)
دیدگاه کاربران