Craig's review - 7 may 2008
Linda Fairstein knows her crime. She is an ex Manhattan Assistant District Attorney and advisor to such hit shows as ‘Law and Order'. To quote her, “One of my proudest legacies at the office of the New York County District Attorney was the establishment of an offshoot of the Sex Crimes Prosecution Unit that I led for twenty-six years.” She puts so much of this knowledge and experience into her latest novel, ‘Killer Heat' (Little, Brown, 2008), creating a sexual predator who is nothing short of a monster, a man who has learnt from the judicial system that it's better just to kill his victims than leave them to tell their story.
‘Killer Heat' is a meaty novel. Its main plot begins with the discovery of a decomposing (to put it nicely) corpse in an abandoned government office, at a ferry slip. When a cat-o'-nine-tails is found nearby in the water, and the victim's life is investigated, we are led to believe it may be the work of a killer preying on prostitutes. The fact that the woman's apartment was cleaned out suggests a cover-up.
But that's been done before.
The novel has a wonderful main trio of characters. Its ‘eyes', the main character, Alexandra Cooper (or Coop) is a prosecutor in charge of the Sex Crimes Prosecution Unit in the Manhattan District Attorney's Office (write what you know, right?). Then there is Mike Chapman, a second-grade detective in the Manhattan North Homicide Squad. Mike is brazen, unafraid to bend protocol – in fact, it is once such act that gives them their biggest break in the case (and I love that this cheekily makes light of the bold statement that many of the city's biggest killers were caught by sheer luck). Alex has partnered with Mike for over a decade, supervising sex crimes. He acts like Alex's overprotective brother, though it's not hard to sense something more between them. Then there is Mercer Wallace, a first-grade detective assigned to the NYPD's Special Victims Unit. This trio chiefly travel together to solve the crimes, their chemistry and the demands of the separate divisions perfect for twisting the plot in several directions.
Alex is called to the first crime because the description matches that of a twenty-two year-old woman whose disappearance she had been assigned to investigate. Only that woman turns out to be victim number two, and this lady was definitely not a prostitute. Only when a third victim's body turns up, wrapped in a green blanket like the previous body, does a connection begin to appear. But it may be too late. A fourth woman has gone missing, in the vicinity of the last murder. With the heat rising in New York City, it's the perfect time for more murder.
The only other lead is what all of the woman were wearing. It seems our killer can't resist the lure of a woman in uniform, which means Alex must dig into his psyche to find out just why such authority could turn someone on, or drive a man to commit vicious acts of revenge.
The subplot of the novel has Alex in court, helping to put away a rapist who escaped sentence for decades because of the lack of DNA collection and credibility during his ‘peak' rampage. During this case, thugs from a gang in a previous novel keep interrupting the court session. They represent Pablo Pasano, from the Latin Princes gang, who Alex helped put away. And it seems that the gang members will do anything for their boss's approval, which includes taking bold shots at Alex – ramming her with their car, shooting at her at a police firing range. Though certain members are caught, this story is left wide open for more thrills in subsequent novels.
My first surprise was that this novel was written in the first person. I guess this is because the large bulk of crime thrillers I have read lately have been in the third, but after perusing my bookshelf I realised this isn't uncommon. Many crime thrillers are written in the first person, including one of my favourites – Harry Bosch, Michael Connelly's star character. What disappointed me was that a first person point of view usually allows a deep ‘character invasion', yet these strengths were never really explored. Alex Cooper gave an adequate amount of insight that kept the pace of the novel flowing nicely, but I couldn't help but want more of a reaction to such events as the repeated attempts on her life and her reactions to the discovery of each body. That said, it was a lengthy novel without such insight, and editing may have played a part in this.
That is the only complaint I have. The novel even has a map of the scenes within, for those unfamiliar with Manhattan. I thoroughly enjoyed the novel, and I feel awful, because I had never sought Fairstein's writing prior to this review. Being the tenth Alexandra Cooper novel, a wonderful achievement and milestone, I now have to start chasing her previous work. And for that, my wife will have to kill me. Anyone want to write about that case?
