Deadly Secrets (Erika Foster Book 6) by Robert Bryndza

• Paperback: 328 pages
• Publisher: Bookouture (10 April 2018)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1786814285
• ISBN-13: 978-1786814289

Synopsis

To commit the perfect murder, you need the perfect cover.
On an icy morning, a mother wakes to find her daughter’s blood-soaked body frozen to the road. Who would carry out such a killing on the victim’s doorstep?

Straight off her last harrowing case, Detective Erika Foster is feeling fragile but determined to lead the investigation. As she sets to work, she finds reports of assaults in the same quiet South London suburb where the woman was killed. One chilling detail links them to the murder victim – they were all attacked by a figure in black wearing a gas mask.

Erika is on the hunt for a killer with a terrifying calling card. The case gets more complicated when she uncovers a tangled web of secrets surrounding the death of the beautiful young woman.

Yet just as Erika begins to piece the clues together, she is forced to confront painful memories of her past. Erika must dig deep, stay focused and find the killer. Only this time, one of her own is in terrible danger…

Review

Deadly Secrets is the sixth book in the Detective Erika Foster series.  This book follows Erika and her team as they try to find out the identity of the killer of a young woman by a  person in a gas mask.  She is not the first victim of this killer, but will she be the last?  This may be the sixth in the series, but Robert Bryndza keeps each book fresh by having a slightly different formula for the plot.  In some of the books we know who the killer is fairly early on and follow their psyche and motives to murder.  In others the killer is revealed about half way through and in others, like this book, we don’t find out until the very end who the murderer is, unless you guess it yourself that is.  As a reader this different approach to each book stops the series from becoming staid, you are never sure when you will find out who is the killer.

Throughout this series the books the characters have continued to develop, we learn more about them as police officers and as people. In Deadly Secrets we see a more emotional side to Erika as she has to deal with her father in law becoming unwell and Peterson returning to work after being injured.  She has to put her family before her job for a short while, whilst she cares for her father in law , which lets the reader see Erika in a different way.  There is tension between Erika and Peterson as they are now working as a team again professionally, but their personal relationship has some to an end.  It is obvious they both still have feelings for each other but its one of those ‘will they won’t they’ scenarios  where you sometimes feeling like bashing their heads together. Add into this sexual tension the fact that Peterson has a secret, and you get an opportunity for friction, hurt and a fallout.  Moss has always been a dependable character, a good head on her shoulders, the voice of reason and Erika’s right hand woman.  With Erika having to go away it is Moss who temporarily steps up to take charge of the investigation and this is the first time we see her composure slip and the pressure of the job getting to her.

In all books the killer is meant to be creepy, but in Deadly Secrets Robert Bryndza creates a dark chilling killer.  Tall, dressed all in black, a gas mask covering the face, coming out of the shadows at night; this is a personification of the bogey man for me.  The darkness of the plot is further exemplified as this book is set at Christmas, but there is no season of goodwill for the family of the murder victim or Erica’s team.

I have become a huge fan of Robert Bryndza’s ErikaFoster series, and I think the best way to appreciate them is to read them in order.  Deadly Secrets is dark, thrilling and gripping in its plot line and has some wonderfully flawed characters who all have secrets  they don’t want revealed. A real edge of the seat,  heart racing, chilling crime drama; another triumph for Robert Bryndza.

Thank you for reading my review of Deadly Secrets.  I have previously reviewed a few of the previous books in the series so please search my reviews and take a look.