Tag: blogathon

Every story has a beginning . . . 

They met for the first time in college. Two of the brightest minds ever to graduate from the prestigious Stanford University. They met again in Quantico, Virginia. Robert Hunter has become the head of the LAPD’s Ultra Violent Crimes Unit. Lucien Folter has become the most prolific and dangerous serial killer in FBI history.

The FBI caught Lucien. He’s been in prison for years. But Lucien has just escaped. And he’s angry. He’s going to make the person who put him away suffer.

That person . . . is Robert Hunter.

And every story must come to an end . . . 

My thoughts: If you’ve been reading this series too, you will maybe remember Lucian Folter from An Evil Mind, formerly Hunter’s college roommate, now the most dangerous and prolific serial killer the FBI has ever encountered. 

If not, you’re about to meet possibly the most evil man around. He’s deadly and completely devoid of care, he kills to study death and the only person who might be able to get inside his mind and stop him is Hunter. Lucian currently hates Hunter and wants him dead for his part in catching him last time, so this is very personal. 

As the two men circle one another, each trying to out think the other, the body count rises. Can Hunter recapture this monster or has he finally met his match? 

Assisted as always by his partner, Garcia, as well as the FBI and a federal marshal, Hunter needs to stop Lucian before he kills anyone else, or Hunter himself.

Totally gripping and horribly shocking, this really ups the ante by making it incredibly personal to Hunter, not just because this is his city, but because people close to him are in danger and Lucian Folter won’t just stop and go away.  

*I was kindly gifted a copy of this book in exchange for taking part in this blog tour, but all opinions remain my own.

After a tough week, Tanya Kaitlin is looking forward to a relaxing night in, but as she steps out of her shower, she hears her phone ring. The video call request comes from her best friend, Karen Ward. Tanya takes the call and the nightmare begins.

Karen is gagged and bound to a chair in her own living room. If Tanya disconnects from the call, if she looks away from the camera, he will come after her next, the deep, raspy, demonic voice at the other end of the line promises her.

As Detectives Robert Hunter and Carlos Garcia investigate the threats, they are thrown into a rollercoaster of evil, chasing a predator who scouts the streets and social media networks for victims, taunting them with secret messages and feeding on their fear.

My thoughts: The murders in this latest instalment of the Hunter & Garcia books are really grisly. The killer calls the best friend, the husband, the sister, of his chosen victim and forces them to play a horrific game, before killing their loved one in front of them, via video call. There’s nothing they can do to stop him, and each murder is extremely brutal.

Hunter and Garcia can’t find the link between the victims, they seem to have been chosen completely at random, and they have no idea who the killer is. They’re in a race against time to stop him from taking more lives, but when it seems the victims could be anyone, how can they predict where he might strike next?

Hunter also gets a bit of a personal life, meeting the lovely psychology professor in the UCLA library and connecting over their love for Scottish whisky. It’s nice to see Hunter off duty for a change, obviously, his brilliant mind is searching for the killer, but all the previous books have him just working and not sleeping, this gives us another side to his character.

Another edge-of-your-seat, twist-you-won’t- see-coming read, with writing that keeps you hooked (or at least it does me).

*I was kindly gifted a copy of this book in exchange for taking part in this blog tour, but all opinions remain my own.

In this pulse-pounding thriller from bestselling writer Chris Carter, criminal behavior psychologist turned LAPD detective Robert Hunter finds himself engaged in a brutal game to the finish with a ruthless opponent. But no matter what moves Hunter makes, death is coming….

At the Los Angeles International Airport, the body of a twenty-year-old woman is discovered. The autopsy reveals that she had been tortured and murdered in a most bizarre way—but the surprises don’t end there. The killer likes to play, and he left something behind for the cops to find.

LAPD Detective Robert Hunter is assigned to the case but almost immediately a second body turns up. Surrounded by new challenges as every day passes, Hunter finds himself chasing a monster—one with a dark past and whose desire to hurt people and thirst for murder can never be quenched.

My thoughts: After the vacation that wasn’t, Robert Hunter returns to LA to be faced with a new case, another gruesome and violent one. He and Garcia are called out to a body by the airport, the victim was brutally tortured to death, and she won’t be the last.

Taunting the detectives by leaving the message I AM DEATH with each poor victim, the duo feel like they’re getting nowhere, until the killer makes a mistake that will bring Hunter to his door. 

Another shocking and gripping case for Hunter and Garcia – there’s a method of murder in this one that actually succeeded in making me flinch, I am pretty unshockable most of the time. The story has a dual narrative, with a clever twist, and the identity of the killer, and their motivation is something you won’t see coming.

*I was kindly gifted a copy of this book in exchange for taking part in this blog tour, but all opinions remain my own.

‘I need your help, Detective. Fire or water?’

Detective Robert Hunter of the LAPD’s Homicide Special Section receives an anonymous call asking him to go to a specific web address – a private broadcast. Hunter logs on and a show devised for his eyes only immediately begins. But the caller doesn’t want Detective Hunter to just watch, he wants him to participate, and refusal is simply not an option.

Forced to make a sickening choice, Hunter must sit and watch as an unidentified victim is tortured and murdered live over the Internet. The LAPD, together with the FBI, use everything at their disposal to electronically trace the transmission down, but this killer is no amateur, and he has covered his tracks from start to finish.

And before Hunter and his partner Garcia are even able to get their investigation going, Hunter receives a new phone call. A new website address. A new victim. But this time the killer has upgraded his game into a live murder reality show, where anyone can cast the deciding vote.

My thoughts: Another gripping and stomach churning case for detectives Hunter and Garcia, this time with a killer who is manipulating them with technology. Turning death onto a reality show, where the audience votes on the method of execution.

Of course that audience probably believes they’re watching something staged, not real deaths. But Hunter and Garcia know differently and they are racing to shut this horror show down.

Hunter’s insomnia, always an issue, means he can’t let go of the things he’s seen and now countless others are watching murder happen in front of their eyes, whether they believe it’s real or not. The killer is exploiting new technology and people’s inability to look away.

Bringing in the FBI and their own advanced tech in order to try to track and locate the killer, and the site of his home made nightmare, is deemed necessary, even as it causes resentment. Hunter doesn’t really enjoy collaboration or being told what to do. But even he can see that the LAPD doesn’t have the resources to do this on their own. But it’s still his case, and he will find the killer. 

*I was kindly gifted a copy of this book in exchange for taking part in this blog tour, but all opinions remain my own.

‘Good job you didn’t turn on the lights . . .’ A student nurse has the shock of her life when she discovers her patient, prosecutor Derek Nicholson, brutally murdered in his bed. The act seems senseless – Nicholson was terminally ill with only weeks to live. But what most shocks Detective Robert Hunter of the Los Angeles Robbery Homicide Division is the calling card the killer left behind.

For Hunter, there is no doubt that the killer is trying to communicate with the police, but the method is unlike anything he’s ever seen before. And what could the hidden message be?

Just as Hunter and his partner Garcia reckon they’ve found a lead, a new body is found – and a new calling card. But with no apparent link between the first and second victims, all the progress they’ve made so far goes out of the window.

Pushed into an uncomfortable alliance with confident investigator Alice Beaumont, Hunter must race to put together the pieces of the puzzle . . . before the Death Sculptor puts the final touches to his masterpiece.

My thoughts: Another creepy and chilling killer for Hunter and Garcia to find, LA seems to attract the worst monsters. This one is turning his victims into strange flesh sculptures. Hunter knows there’s a message here, but he needs to figure out what it is so they can solve the case.

They’re asked to work with DA’s investigator Alice Beaumont on the case, she’s an interesting addition to their partnership and brings a different perspective to the case.

It’s a race against time to figure out what the killer is saying with his disturbing artworks, keeping the reader guessing as to how exactly the detectives are going to solve another case before anyone else gets killed.

*I was kindly gifted a copy of this book in exchange for taking part in this blog tour, but all opinions remain my own.