In her debut thriller (though not her 1st written work), Matheson dives right into the goriest of serial murders and the angsty-est of protagonists. Our angsty hero is Detective Inspector Anjelica Henley who, on her first day back to active duty after a severe injury, finds herself confronted with dismembered body parts - parts that are clearly not all from the same body. And if that's not bad enough, the way in which the victims are found is all too similar to the pattern set by Peter Olivier, a serial murderer known as the Jigsaw Man, who has been in prison for the past two years. Anjelica and her trainee partner, Salim Ramouter, are faced with not only finding the killer but determining if the Jigsaw Man is pulling the strings from behind bars.
Matheson does a great job at building the tension for her characters and the reader in this fast-moving novel. Henley's relationship with Peter Olivier will bring to mind Clarice and Hannibal and the comparison is a fair one, if only on the surface. The world Anjelica inhabits and the experiences she's had as a Black woman in London and on a police force still primarily dominated by white men, give her a unique perspective which impacts the way in which she interacts with and confronts Peter Olivier.
I look forward to reading more of DI Henley's investigations with the Serial Crime Unit.