Perfect Remains

Goodreads Description

On a remote Highland mountain, the body of Elaine Buxton is burning. All that will be left to identify the respected lawyer are her teeth and a fragment of clothing. In the concealed back room of a house in Edinburgh, the real Elaine Buxton screams into the darkness. Detective Inspector Luc Callanach has barely set foot in his new office when Elaine’s missing persons case is escalated to a murder investigation. Having left behind a promising career at Interpol, he’s eager to prove himself to his new team. But Edinburgh, he discovers, is a long way from Lyon, and Elaine’s killer has covered his tracks with meticulous care. It’s not long before another successful woman is abducted from her doorstep, and Callanach finds himself in a race against the clock. Or so he believes … The real fate of the women will prove more twisted than he could have ever imagined.

My Review

In the one corner of the ring, we have one of the most depraved, sick and terrifying serial killers I've ever come across. And in the other corner, we have the new Detective Inspector, Callanach, who has arrived from France and is yet to earn the respect of his team.

With these two characters pitted against each other from the very start of the book, I knew that I was in for a great read. And absolutely great it was. The two characters were so well developed and interesting that I couldn't wait to see how the story would unfold. I was totally hooked from the get-go.

At the risk of sounding pretty screwed up, I do like my serial killers to be extremely dark, twisted and depraved. And this serial killer ticked all the boxes for me. There were times when my skin absolutely crawled as I listened (yes, I listened to this book as an audio book) to what he did to his victims and the way he spoke to them, the psychology that he used on them and the treatment that he dished out on a daily basis. I couldn't help but say a little prayer to keep me safe from any potential killers that might be sharing the same city as me. That's how badly this serial killer got under my skin.

As mentioned above, I listened to the audio book version of this novel and I couldn't wait to get into my car every day and into the traffic so that I could catch up with DI Callanach and his team. I thought that the narration of this book was absolutely fantastic and the narrator did an exceptional job of all the different accents and of changing his voice in such a way that I knew exactly who was who in the zoo. The performance was a 5 star performance.

This is the first book in a new series involving DI Callanach, and I'll definitely be buying the next book as soon as it's published in South Africa. I really loved this first book. Like I say, the characters were great and the cat and mouse game was very gripping. If I had to be a tiny bit critical, my only complaint would be that I found that the middle section of the story lagged slightly and I didn't really enjoy the sub-plot of the pregnant girls. I found that part of the book not quite as gripping as the serial killer story. I thought at first that the two different plots must somehow come together and the fact that they didn't was a slight let down. But this is a small criticism in an otherwise great story.

Definitely worth the read!

My Rating: * * * *

Publication Date: January 2017

Genre: Crime Procedural

Format: Audiobook

Source: My own purchased audiobook, purchased through Audible.