Synopsis from goodreads
If the Night Stalker is watching, you’re already dead…
In the dead of a swelteringly hot summer’s night, Detective Erika Foster is called to a murder scene. The victim, a doctor, is found suffocated in bed. His wrists are bound and his eyes bulging through a clear plastic bag tied tight over his head.
A few days later, another victim is found dead, in exactly the same circumstances. As Erika and her team start digging deeper, they discover a calculated serial killer – stalking their victims before choosing the right moment to strike.
The victims are all single men, with very private lives. Why are their pasts shrouded in secrecy? And what links them to the killer?
As a heat wave descends upon London, Erika will do everything to stop the Night Stalker before the body count rises, even if it means risking her job. But the victims might not be the only ones being watched… Erika’s own life could be on the line.
Review (no spoilers)
Thank you NetGalley and Bookouture for giving me a copy of this book.
I really enjoyed The Girl in the Ice which is the first book in the DCI Erika Foster series by Robert Bryndza. You can read my review here. Naturally, I was excited when I found out that a second book had been released.
Like the first book, The Night Stalker is well paced and the story moves along quite fast. I was pulled into the story right from the page and kept struggling to put it down. In the first chapter, the mystery had already been introduced and the first murder had occurred.
Unlike the narrative in The Girl in the Ice, we now get to know the identity of the killer a bit sooner. However, the mystery is still not lost. It is interesting to see how the detectives work together to catch the killer.
I also liked the fact that there was so much going on at the same time. We have the murders and a serial killer on the loose, a heat wave, another ongoing case involving child pornography, some chemistry between characters, a novelist with a weird fascination. All these events help create some drama and move the story along.
I liked the character of DCI Erika Foster in this book more than I did in the first one. There is still a lot of drama surrounding her mainly due to her tendency to go rogue. However, she is still brilliant and likable especially in this book when we see her forming more relationships and connections with other characters. I love the fact that Erika has her complexities too. She has demons from her past due to the death of her husband and this keep haunting her. In the first book, her work situation bothered me but this time round, even the dramas played into building the complex character that makes Erika so endearing.
There were also a number of other likeable characters. In particular; I liked Peterson and Moss who were introduced to readers in the first book. Dr. Strong was also quite a memorable and endearing character. I am not kidding when I saw I liked most of the characters. I even liked one who was in comatose almost throughout the book. Robert Bryndza did a wonderful job with the character development. He also threw in a few other characters who made the book quite intriguing.
I liked the serial killer’s twist. I can’t say anything more about this without spoiling the book because one of the main twists of the story has to do with the killer. I’ll just say that it was nice to see something different from the norm.
Another thing that I enjoyed was the shifting perspectives. The book is mainly narrated from the perspective of DCI Erika. However, there are few chapters where the perspective shifts to different characters including the serial killer’s. This helped in the flow of the narration and in understanding of the characters’ actions.
I don’t want to say too much about the book because of spoilers but seriously, if you enjoy reading thrillers/mystery then you definitely need to read Robert Bryndza books. You can start with The Girl in the Ice just so that you can get familiar with the characters. However, you can still enjoy reading The Night Stalker as a standalone. Brilliant, enjoyable and thrilling page turner, I give this book 5 stars.
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A Haven for Book Lovers 
I really really need to find the time to read this!
I hope that you will enjoy it once you get the time. Have you already read The Girl in the Ice?
I like serial killer stories. I will have to make sure that I keep the first book on my TBR. I go on a deleting spree every other day. Great review!
Thanks Lekeisha. I hope that you will enjoy the book once you get to it. The series is really good. How does the deleting spree work? Are you doing it to control your TBR?
I just go to my Goodreads to-read shelf and delete books I’m no longer interested in. Especially if I don’t have the book in my possession yet. I mostly delete the ones that have been on the list for more than 2 years. I also clean my book shelves at home of the ones I no longer want. Those go to the library or my cousins.