Straight Into Darkness

By: Faye Kellerman

Narrated by: Paul Michael

As night descends, a killer awaits…

With ten consecutive New York Times bestsellers, Faye Kellerman is truly a "master of mystery" (Cleveland Plain Dealer). Now she turns her acute eye on 1920s Munich, a war-wounded city rocked by political agitation and stalked by a nameless, barbaric butcher.

Lustmord–the joy of murder. The terrifying concept seems apt for the brutal slaying of a beautiful young society wife dumped in the vast English Garden. Homicide inspector Axel Berg is horrified by the crime…and disturbed by the artful arrangement of the victim's clothes and hair –a madman's portrait of death.

Berg's superiors demand quick answers and a quick arrest: a vagrant, the woman's husband, anyone who can be demonized will do. When a second body is discovered, the city erupts into panic, the unrest fomented by the wild-eyed, hate-mongering Austrian Adolf Hitler and his Brownshirt party of young thugs.

Berg can trust no one as he relentlessly hunts a ruthless killer, dodging faceless enemies and back-alley intrigue, struggling to bring a fiend to justice before the country–and his life–veer straight into darkness.©2005 Faye Kellerman; (P)2005 Books on Tape, Inc.

SID Review

Disturbing on many levels but puts you in the time and place.

Not her best

I generally like this writer. Her writing is clear and her stories engaging. This one dragged on and on. It was all bed Germans good Jews, look how they suffered. The story was weak and the characters way too ordinary.

The Weimar Republic

This is on a par with the Bernie Gunther series, by Phillip Kerr. Realistic. I'll look for more!

Good historical mystery

Okay, I did fast-forward through Hitler's speeches, but I thought Kellerman did a good job creating the atmosphere of pre-WWII Germany. That atmosphere is critical to the story. The protagonist is a German who despises Hitler and who must conduct his investigation in the face of bigotry that infuses the police force as well as as the general population. The novel may not appeal to Kellerman's regular readers but will be enjoyable for readers who enjoy historical mysteries.

Blech!

I expect a lot better from Faye Kellerman. This book is really depressing and there seems to be no point to it at all. I am quite surprised because I love her Dekker/Lazarus mysteries. I would have guessed this was an early book, but it's 2005!