4 stars from me

I really enjoy the Luc Callanach character, appearing almost too good to be true, he has a great back story which gets fully developed in Perfect Death and we understand a lot more about him and his relationship with his mother during this book.

The story itself is very clever, with little sub-stories that inevitably interweave and merge as the tale develops. In fact there are two main threads to this book and one of them contains micro-stories as you are introduced to each new victim. The killer is clever too and (without wishing to give anything away) their different ways of ensnaring their victims is really well constructed and orchestrated. Helen Fields has peppered throughout the book several emotional punches that are delivered with skill and aplomb.

DCI Ava Turner finds herself newly promoted and she is a great female lead – and a much more tangible character than Luc Callanach, for me anyway.

DI Luc Callanach and DCI Ava Turner’s relationship is an interesting one, will they won’t they? I think we all know they’d like to!

Synopsis: Unknown to DI Luc Callanach and the newly promoted DCI Ava Turner, a serial killer has Edinburgh firmly in his grip. The killer is taking his victims in the coldest, most calculating way possible – engineering slow and painful deaths by poison, with his victims entirely unaware of the drugs flooding their bloodstream until it’s too late.

But how do you catch a killer who hides in the shadows? A killer whose pleasure comes from watching pain from afar? Faced with their most difficult case yet, Callanach and Turner soon realise they face a seemingly impossible task…