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🌟🌟🌟🌟 1/2

A profoundly chilling thriller, seamlessly blending horror, suspense, police procedure, somewhat-unpredictable twists and turns, and a masterful smattering of characters, including a strong and interesting female lead – Detective Senior Sergeant Veronika Pope.

Head of the Special Crime Squad, which investigates cold cases in and around Perth, Australia, Veronika has her work cut out for her when a grisly camcorder recording, recovered in an old attic, points to a series of sadistic crimes originating in the late 90s or early 2000s. In this reader’s view, the crimes, although horrific, are not described in enough detail to warrant a warning, with the exception of the animal note. (See below).

Veronika is a layered and complex character, balancing career, family life and single motherhood, as she struggles to put the aftermath of a violent injury, and the footprint it has left imprinted on her psyche, into some semblance of stability.

As Veronika and her team race to uncover both the victims and the perpetrator, the pace never lets up – moving forward so resolutely, and with such a blistering flow, that this read flies by – the underlying tone of horror, creepiness and menace building to a satisfying and climactic finale, that, as would be expected, (no spoilers here), comes as both a release and a relief.

A new author to this reader (a big fan of Australian crime fiction), with this taste I’m hooked, and looking forward to reading more of her work.

A great big thank you to the author and the publisher for an ARC of this book. All thoughts presented are my own.

Note: For those readers (like me) who cannot abide cruelty to animals, one incident involving a cousin and the abuse of a dog is easily recognized and skipped. I ended up scanning and skipping about 3 pages.