An art professor has killed a whole series of women over the past few years, and bothered many others by sending them pictures that he's drawn that show them nude. Up until now, none of the bodies has been found, but then one turns up, and along with it one of the pictures, which sets Lucas on the trail of the murderer, trying to find out who he is before he kills again.

This was a pretty good one, but, it was a mistake to read it straight after Rules of Prey, because the plots were pretty similar. In RoP, the killer even referred to his victims as "the chosen". And like RoP, Lucas identifies a girl as being a likely victim of the killer, and tries to setup a trap to catch him. And like RoP, the killer manages to evade the police surveillance when he works out he's being watched.

It's a better book than Rules of Prey, and does stand up on its own. But while I've generally rated the Prey books for not being formulaic, these two are a bit similar and so probably are best read with some distance between them (not in quick succession!)

Re-read (in sequence) in 2014.

I'd forgotten most of this one, but thought it was pretty good. You know the killer from the outset, and Lucas works it out a fair while before the end but they can't prove it.

They talk to killer's girlfriend about suspicions and she's eager to help entrap him but makes him suspicious with her behaviour. This frustrates the cops and was effective because I was feeling frustrated with her too - "no, don't say that you idiot!"

Completed : 16-Jun-2007

Completed : 30-Aug-2014