The discovery of a skeleton buried beneath the altar of an old chapel should not have raised an eyebrow, but this one was different. This one had been savagely murdered, and all the evidence points to the blood-thirsty killer the press have dubbed ‘The Beast of Barnwell’; a killer who has already served time for the brutal murder of a young girl and is now free.

Is this his handiwork?

In the midst of the enquiry, a 22 year old woman is abducted on her way home from work. Is there a link?

To add to Hunter’s workload his former boss, Michael Robshaw, is deliberately mown down and left for dead.

Why?

In his search for the truth Hunter returns to his undercover roots – with deadly consequences

My thanks to Darren at Caffeine Nights for my review copy. Also to Noelle the Crime Book Junkie who invited me to join the Shadow of the Beast Blog Tour.

Shadow of the Beast is the 5th Hunter Kerr novel which means I join a series without knowing the backstory. This did not have the slightest impact upon my enjoyment of the story but there were references to events gone by – always a reward for a returning reader!  Michael Fowler has done a great job of ensuring new readers have enough information to keep up with new developments, important info is conveyed with a simple, quick efficiency and the story keeps a good pace.

In Shadow of the Beast we have a bit of a gruesome opening – construction workers have uncovered a skull during the excavation of an old abandoned building. The police are called and further (more careful) digging uncovers the rest of a skeleton. It is clothed in garments from the 1980’s and alarmingly the police find that a cow’s head has been substituted for the original skull.

The narrative jumps to another part of the city where the reader gets to witness a hit and run accident take place. Only this is no accident, the driver reverses over the fallen body of the victim before speeding off into the night. The consequences of this deed will shake Kerr’s team to its foundations and stretch the department resources to their limits both physically and mentally.

A cold case from 30 years ago and an active investigation with no obvious motivation, the narrative is nicely split and I was totally hooked. Then came the best treat of all – the dawning realisation that Michael Fowler must have served as a police officer – as this was one of the finest police procedurals I have read for some time and had an authenticity in many scenes which not every crime novel can capture.

Despite not having had the advantage of reading the books that preceded Shadow of the Beast I really warmed to Hunter Kerr and the rest of his squad, the interaction between the team and their obvious friendship and mutual trust made me want to keep reading – if the characters engage me then I know I am reading a strong story.

As with many of the books that I have read from publishers Caffeine Nights there are some delightfully dark twists in Shadow (did I mention that skull thing?)The best way to hold my attention and keep those pages turning is to ensure the twists and surprises keep coming, Shadow of the Beast did just that and I will be adding more of Mr Fowler’s books to my reading list – he can tell a great story.

Shadow of the Beast is published by Caffeine Nights and is available to download by clicking through on this link: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Shadow-Beast-Hunter-Kerr-Novel-ebook/dp/B01LYIGKMX/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1475793360&sr=8-3&keywords=shadow+of+the+beast