She put her fingers to her nose and sniffed something like soot or ash. At first she thought her face had been disfigured then realised there were no wounds on her cheeks. So where did the burnt smell come from? Tentatively she moved her fingertips to her eye sockets. That’s when she started screaming.
There is a brutal sexual predator on the loose in Melbourne. Someone is attacking young women, knocking them senseless and leaving them mutilated. The first woman is blinded, the next has her ears damaged. The attacks are getting worse, and women are dying. Detective Marita Van Hassel, from the Melbourne Sexual Crimes Squad, is called on to use both her profiling and investigative skills to try to catch this animal. But the killer is proving elusive, and he has Rita in his sights as well.
The Shadow Maker is a thrilling and disturbing crime novel, from new novelist Robert Sims. With some really dark moments, the novel is frightening in places, but Sims contrasts this with some romance and the day to day life of the detective character, to make it balanced and absorbing. Readers will find this book hard to put down and will be looking forward to more from Sims and his character, Rita Van Hassel.
The Shadow Maker, by Robert Sims
Arena, an imprint of Allen & Unwin, 2007