Reviewed by Tammy

TITLE: Empathy for a Killer

AUTHOR: Sarah Masters

PUBLISHER: Pride Publishing

LENGTH: 202 pages

RELEASE DATE: June 13, 2017 

BLURB:

Finding a killer isn’t easy, but someone’s got to do it…

Detective Burgess Varley is called out to view a dead body. It isn’t one of the best things about his job” but putting killers away for the rest of their lives? Now that’s one of the best. Problem is, the victim has something in her mouth that has always scared Burgess something that links him to the killer without him even knowing it. And that link is more than Burgess might be able to handle.

Detective Shaw Peters, Burgess’s partner for several years, loves Burgess in ways he perhaps shouldn’t. Or ways that Burgess won’t accept, anyway. But Shaw isn’t one to back down from a challenge, and as well as being by Burgess’s side on the hunt for a killer, he has his own mission to accomplish, getting Burgess to admit they’re meant for each other. It won’t be easy, but by God, he’s going to give it a try.

With Burgess and the killer learning things about themselves, their lives, and each other that they previously hadn’t known, life and death is about to become serious.

REVIEW:

I admit I was a bit hesitant when I first started reading Empathy for a Killer but as I got further into the story the emotional torment of the two MC’s for two very different reasons made me change my mind! For me the MC’s in this book are not the lovers, they are the detective and the murderer they are so alike yet at the same time so very different, for obvious reasons. The story is set in England so the language, tone and pronunciation is very different from American stories but don’t let that put you off because this is a brilliant book!!

Detective Burgess Varley has been given a murder case with three bodies but no leads or clues about why, until he visits his mother and she says how similar his case is to two murders that happened sixteen years ago. This is unsettling to Burgess as certain details of the murders haven’t been released to the public but as his mother describes the previous murders he realises they are identical! This starts Burgess and his partner Detective Shaw Peters on the road of discovery, uncovering the fact that his murdered father isn’t the icon his mother and indirectly Burgess has made him out to be for the last thirty years. Burgess and Shaw have been partners on the force for years and they are both desperately in love with each other but they’ve only been to bed together once. This is not because they don’t want to it’s because Burgess is terrified that once he allows Shaw into his life as more than his work partner Shaw at some point will die and he’ll be left alone just like when his father was murdered. Everything changes when they begin to investigate the deaths of the three victims.

We learn that the murderer was abused so horrifically as a child it left him completely broken as an adult that, not only do you begin to feel sorry for him, you understand why he has done what he’s done. Don’t get me wrong, nothing can ever condone murder but my-god you can certainly understand why he has done it!! Empathy for a Killer is such an emotional story, it makes you take a step back and take a good hard look at society. Sadly, you’ll most likely conclude that a good portion of it sucks! This is one book you don’t want to miss out on reading.

RATING:

BUY LINKS: 

Pride Publishing

Amazon