When the tortured body of a young woman is found in a dumpster, her eyes swollen shut and her clothes soaked with blood, Detective Erika Foster is one of the first at the crime scene. The trouble is, this time, it’s not her case.
Stalking his victims online, the killer is preying on young pretty women using a fake identity. How will Erika catch a murderer who doesn’t seem to exist?
Then another girl is abducted while waiting for a date. Erika and her team must get to her before she becomes another dead victim, and, come face to face with a terrifyingly sadistic individual.
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Last Breath is the fourth Detective Erika Foster novel from Robert Bryndza. I’ve loved every one of them. They just seem to get better and better.
Erika is still not happy in her current post – in the Projects Team. She is not meant for pen-pushing and is desperate to get back to the Murder Investigation Team and do the job she is best at.
The book opens with a body being placed in a large rubbish container and the subsequent discovery of the mutilated body.
Although no longer a part of the Murder Investigation Team, Erika, due to circumstances, manages to be one of the first officers at the scene where she has a run in with Superintendent Sparks. Despite being told to leave in no uncertain terms, being Erika, she goes behind his back and talks to witnesses.
When she later get more information from a witness, she passes it on the the officer in charge but again she is warned to stay out of the investigation. Of course, she continues to make her own enquiries. She comes across a potential link to another case and passes the information on to the DCI in charge of the case but gets no response. To compound her woes it turns out Erika had applied to be transferred back to the Murder Investigation Team but has been turned down.
Her frustration at being locked out of the case is so great that she even considers apologising to Sparks and is prepared to grovel to get back to what she does best – solving murders.
It’s a very good, satisfying thriller that moves along at a good pace. You do get to know “whodunnit” early on. It’s as if you are able to see inside the head of the killer and the lengths he will go to, to avoid being caught. There is a kind of game of cat and mouse between the killer and the Police. He uses fake identities on social media to trap his victims and then later tortures them. The story is sometimes quite dark and violent but it never seems excessive. There is a good balance of action, dialogue and background information. The different threads of the story come together very well. I think also that knowing the identity of the killer early on makes it even more exciting. There are also red herrings and plot twists and the action keeps on coming right to the end.
I like the way that Erika and other characters have developed and changed since the first book. Erika has definitely softened a little and mellowed since the first book but her tenacious and sometimes stubborn streak still appears. Former colleagues are also back in this book. Having said that you could easily read book 4 as a stand alone and still enjoy it. Previous relationships are briefly explained where necessary. Of course if you read all four books in the correct order I think you would get even more enjoyment.
Occasionally you get a series of books where the first one is exciting and brilliant but over time subsequent stories seem less exciting and fresh. I certainly haven’t found that with Robert Bryndza’s books. I think they get better and better. I wouldn’t hesitate to recommend his books to people who enjoy a good well plotted crime thriller.
Note: When I started to draft a review of Robert’s latest Erika Foster novel (Cold Blood) I realised I hadn’t actually posted a review of Last Breath. Maybe you can tell I’m a fan of all Robert’s writing.
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