When Santa isn’t that jolly man we all know…

Synopsis

The Santa Killer is coming to town…

One night less than two weeks before Christmas, a single mother is violently assaulted. It’s a brutal crime at the time of year when there should be goodwill to all. When DI Barton begins his investigation, he’s surprised to find the victim is a woman with nothing to hide and no reason for anyone to hurt her. 

A few days later, the mother of the woman attacked rings the police station. Her granddaughter has drawn a shocking picture. It seems she was looking out of the window when her mother was attacked. And when her grandmother asks the young girl who the person with the weapon is, she whispers two words. 

Bad Santa.

The rumours start spreading, and none of the city’s women feel safe – which one of them will be next?

He’s got a list. It’s quite precise. It won’t matter even if you’re nice.

My review

DI Barton feels the pressure of closing his latest case as soon as possible. Not because starting the New Year with a clean sleeve would be optimal, but because just two weeks before Christmas, there is someone out there assaulting women. Women who have nothing to hide and absolutely no reason for anyone to hurt.
A victim’s daughter appears to have seen her mother’s attacker and drawn a picture of him, with the words ‘Bad Santa’…
Now all women are fearing for their lives, because nobody has an idea who will be next.  But one thing is for sure, there is a list… And the Santa Killer will not rest until he has completed it… 

This is the first book I have read from this author, and even if it’s the latest addition of his series, it can be perfectly be read as a standalone.
What intrigued me the most about the blurb I have read, was the terror of realizing that the culprit is a character that is overly good. Who would ever think of Santa going assaulting women? 

It’s very often that in books, or even on television and films, that the police officers are totally fitting the clichés we all have.
So I was glad to see that in this book, DI Barton and his colleagues don’t fit in those clichés.
John Barton is the kind of man that when he offers help, he truly means it. He is also genuinely concerned about the victims and their families, and that makes him persistent in  finding who is planting terror in his city. 

He is a very serious man, but also a great colleague. He listens to whatever his colleagues are thinking about the case, but also on a personal level he listens. His team is not just a team of partners at work, but also friends.
He is also a family man, but finds it sometimes difficult to make a clean break when he has clocked out. Luckily he has a very patient wife who understands that he in fact never truly just clocks out.  

In this book, we get to read different point of views, like that one of the DI, but also that one of the victims and even that one of the Santa Killer.
But no matter how much we get to see inside the mind of the Santa Killer, it is not easy to decipher who the man actually is. 

The author manages to drag you into the story, makes you think you have it all figured out, but then adds twists, that makes you wonder what the h*ll is going on. Because even when you think, just like the main characters, the case has been closed, the truth is that we are nowhere near the resolution. 

The moments of terror, and believe me that there are such moments (I will never trust a Santa myself anymore!) are luckily for the readers alternated with funny banters, between colleagues but also between family members.
It would have been easy for the author to add extra layers of heaviness, if the main characters would have more stress moments besides working on the case, but having the characters to be normal, shows us that not always everything has to be going bad in life… 

Like I said, this was the first book I have read from this author, and now I regret having him only discovered now and not sooner…
Because while I felt fear crawling up my skin, it was nearly impossible to put this book away!