Hanging Hill
Mo Hayder
On a picture-perfect morning in Bath, England, a teenage girl’s body is found on the towpath of a canal. Police detective Zoe Benedict is convinced the department head should look beyond the usual domestic motives to solve the brutal murder case. But no one wants to hear any far-fetched ideas from the department’s black sheep…more.
My Rating:
At the discovery of a ghastly murder of a young and beautiful young woman, two sisters find their long deviated paths coming together. Sally and Zoe have a scant history between them, though related, they’ve followed two opposing directions in life. Zoe has put hers behind her and focused her smarts on solving crimes. Sally is starting all over again, a recent divorcee who’ll find herself in a scary, mess of a situation due to her recent monetary struggles.
Hanging Hill by Mo Hayder was her eighth novel, and she had by this time done an excellent job of locking down the detective thriller.
Veering not too far from her Jack Caffery series, Hanging Hill deals in a different kind of human depravity. The flesh trade is front and center, and like the Caffery series, it only runs as one vein in the whole of the plot. With Sally negotiating her teenage daughters antics, she puts herself in the employ of a not so savory man with a history of the flesh trade in Kosovo. Meanwhile, Zoe is working the case of Lorne, a wickedly grotesque murder with plenty of hidden meanings and avenues to explore. Who would murder this beautiful, young woman with a bright future ahead of her?
Hayder delivers her usual terrifying scenes. She does an excellent job of pointing out the most wretched and deplorable things come from the minds of human being we walk with and talk with on a day-to-day basis. Always painting with a deft hand, describing horrific acts with refined detail that still make her books more horror than thriller. This is a book filled with a handful of trigger warnings, taking on self-harm and rape. Not for those with a weak stomach, Mo Hayder is a writer worth visiting, if you can manage it.
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