Review: Cold Blood by Robert Bryndza (audio)

Title: Cold Blood

Author: Robert Bryndza

Series: Detective Erika Foster, #5

Narrator: Jan Cramer

Published: September 2017, Bookouture

Length: 9 hours 34 minutes

Source: Personal copy via Audible

Summary: 

She fell in love with a killer, now she’s one too.

The
suitcase was badly rusted, and took Erika several attempts, but it
yielded and sagged open as she unzipped it. Nothing could prepare her
for what she would find inside…When a battered suitcase
containing the dismembered body of a young man washes up on the shore of
the river Thames, Detective Erika Foster is shocked. She’s worked on
some terrifying cases but never seen anything like this before.

As
Erika and her team set to work, she makes the link with another victim –
the body of a young woman dumped in an identical suitcase two weeks
ago.

Erika quickly realises she’s on the trail of a serial
killer who’s already made their next move. Yet just as Erika starts to
make headway with the investigation, she is the victim of a brutal
attack.

But nothing will stop Erika. As the body count rises,
the twin daughters of her colleague Commander Marsh are abducted, and
the stakes are higher than ever before. Can Erika save the lives of two
innocent children before it’s too late? She’s running out of time and
about to make a disturbing discovery…there’s more than one killer.

My thoughts: This is another series that I just love and find that gets stronger and better with each new installment. This is the 5th book in Robert Bryndza’s Detective Erika Foster crime thriller series. These books are dark and twisted and oh so good!!!

Once again we have an action-packed tale that takes off right from the start and never really lets go until the very end. Unfortunately, things get a little personal this time around as Erika is brutally attacked during the investigation and sidelined for a bit…though, in true Erika fashion, not for long! This is why I love her so much – nothing really keeps her down for long! She is tough and persistent and despite all that happens to her in this book, she still makes this case her number one priority. I do wish, though, that at some point in this series, she gets a little bit of happiness thrown her way – just a little!

I also love that the characters that we meet in these books, the ones that are not necessarily part of the series from book to book, are so well-developed. And they are also not always so likeable. These characters have dimension and complexities to them, and make them more relatable, and you can get a feel for why they may or may not be in the predicament that they find themselves in.

This book is equal parts creepy and disturbing and I loved every bit of it. It’s so easy to get completely caught up in these stories – both for the character development that occurs in each book and for the crime that the team is solving. At times, it is a bit graphic and gruesome, but it is equally intriguing and captivating and keeps me engaged throughout.






Audio thoughts: Once again, Jan Cramer shines in her narration of this series. She just gets these characters and the story lines. I truly believe that having the same narrator narrate this series really helps with the consistency in the voices and nuances of the characters that both Robert Bryndza has created for them and then Jan Cramer has made them to be. This book really comes alive with Jan Cramer’s narration and I so hope she continues narrating the series for as long as Robert Bryndza continues writing it!

Books in this series: 

1. The Girl in the Ice
2. The Night Stalker
3. Dark Water 
4. Last Breath 
5. Cold Blood 
6. Deadly Secrets – due out April 2018