Recently I swore off crime novels (nightmares, basically) but here I am, back again. We started watching Mindhunter on Netflix. It’s about how the FBI’s Behavioural Science Unit gathered information from convicted serial killers, so they could begin to understand how to profile them (yeah, yeah, I know; nightmares), and it’s riveting. By coincidence, our newspaper had an item about best-selling local YA writer Ellie Marney’s new book, The Killing Code. American WWII code-breakers in Washington DC…sounds right up my alley and it’s on my to-read list. But I usually keep up with local authors, and somehow (Covid, perhaps?) I had missed her previous title, the 2020 None Shall Sleep. It’s about how the FBI’s Behavioural Science Unit recruit two teenagers to gather information from convicted juvenile killers…
The two teenagers, Emma Lewis and Travis Bell, have both been touched by terrifying crimes so the project is triggering, to say the least. At first, they’re just conducting interviews. But then they get drawn into an active case, a series of gruesome murders targeting young adults. It turns out that one of their interview subjects, a genius psychopath called Simon Gutmunsson, has insights into the murderer. But is he just manipulating them all? Twists and turns ratchet up the suspense until we’re dragged to an explosive and violent finale. None Shall Sleep is marketed as YA but it easily crosses over into adult fiction. An un-put-downable thriller, and I’m looking forward to the next book, Some Shall Break, due out in June 2023.
Somehow I have let this one slip past me, too, which is criminal because I really loved her Every Breath trilogy. And I LOVED Mindhunter, I was so devastated when I discovered they weren’t making a third series. Back to the library reserve list…