Dead To Me by Stephen Edger

My rating: 2.5 of 5 stars

Category: Adult
Genre: Mystery, Thriller



How do you catch a killer who knows your every move?

Dead To Me is the first book in a new detective series. This is the first time I've read a book by this author and I thought it was just ok. The good thing about it is that I was completely wrong about who I thought was behind the murders. The bad thing about it is that I felt like it sort of came out of left field.

For me a well-plotted mystery points clues at multiple people, while still leaving you surprised at the end, but feeling like you should have seen that coming. I didn't feel that way when I read this. I felt like there were really no clues pointing to the culprit here. The reasoning behind why he did some of the things he did were not explained either. Why the creepy cyber stalking? Sending her the messages the instant she signed up on the dating website was way too coincidental. And the thing with Kate's mother didn't seem to have any reason behind it either, other than to cause her distress.

I didn't find any of the characters all that likable, not even Kate, and she did some really stupid things. She was also a lousy deadbeat mom. I was happy in the end that Kate realized she needed to be a mother to her daughter. She redeemed herself somewhat after that. As for the other characters, all of the detectives kept getting into pissing contests with each other and the cases they were solving seemed more about their personal egos than about finding justice for the victims. I hope this isn't the way most real detectives behave.

Although I liked that the book kept me guessing, I just didn't care for the overall plot of the story and the killer's behavior felt a little all over the place. For those reasons I think I will pass on reading the rest of this series. Thanks NetGalley and Bookouture for sending me a copy of this book for review.



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