Wednesday, October 22, 2008

Review: The Darker Side by Cody McFadyen


Meet FBI Agent Smoky Barrett:

"The current title for my position is NCAVC coordinator. NCAVC stands for the National Center for the Analysis of Violent Crime. It's headquartered in DC. Each Bureau office has a person in charge of NCAVC activities for that geographical area. Death's representative, so to speak. In Podunk that might be a single agent who also carries numerous other responsibilities. Here in Los Angeles we rate a full-time coordinator-in-charge -me- and a multi-agent team. I guess serial killers are like the rest of us: they enjoy the sunny California climate."

On a commercial airline flight to Washington, DC a young woman is murdered in her seat and covered with a blanket. She is found at the end of the flight and FBI Agent Smoky Barrett and her talented team are called in and assigned the case. They must be circumspect, the victim has ties to a political powerhouse and presidential candidate. Before long a second body is found in Los Angeles, seemingly unrelated to the first, and they find themselves on the trail of a serial killer.

When video clips of the victims start showing up on the Internet the pressure in on to catch the nutcase committing the murders before a media firestorm erupts. Turns out the killer knows a very deep secret about each victim and feels that he must make them confess their "sin" before he kills them. How does he select his targets? How does he know their most intimate secrets? And how are they going to track him down before he strikes again?

The plot of this thriller is fast paced and smart, the characters are intriguing and likable. Smoky Barrett has been through the ringer on previous cases and her personal losses have been high. Despite all she has been through, she is a survivor and is excellent at her job. She is complex and interesting and I can't wait to read the first two books in this series, Shadow Man and The Face of Death.

The Darker Side is published by Bantam Dell. ISBN 978-0-553-80694-6.

Cody McFadyen was kind enough to stop by my blog on October 1 for a fascinating guest post, go check it out!

Visit Cody McFadyen's website here.

Many thanks to Dorothy Thompson at Pump Up Your Book Promotion Virtual Book Tours for including me in the tour!



Order The Darker Side from Amazon

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Wow! That book sounds scary.

The Tome Traveller said...

Well, it was a little scary! But also imaginative and interesting, too.

tashiana said...

this looks very cool
love the strong female detective aspect
and yet another book about a serial killer ! i see u enjoy them too :)

Becca said...

Sounds creepy and tense. I love that the main character is a woman named Smoky. How cool is that.


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About Me

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New Hampshire, United States
Bibliophile, Anglophile, Traveller... I have been an avid reader all of my life, since I took the Dr. Seuss Dictionary away from my Mom when I was less than a year old because I wanted to read it myself. In college, where I earned my degree in English Literature, I was often asked "What are you going to do with it?" Now I finally have the answer to that question!!! Being employed as a Flight Attendant for twenty years has given me a lot of life experience and, better still, a lot of time to read. I love to travel for fun, too.