Blog Tour – 20/20 – Carl Goodman*

Can you see a killer before it’s too late?

On the first day of her new job, D.I. Eva Harris is called to the scene of a brutal murder at the heart of Surrey society. A shocking crime by a meticulous killer – who escaped with the victim’s eyes.

With the body drained of blood and no forensic evidence left at the scene, Harris’ efforts to find the killer becomes desperate. But as her investigation is complicated by corruption at the heart of the police, she doesn’t know who to trust on her own team.

As the pressure mounts, Eva realises the murder is even more horrific than it seems, and her own dreadful history threatens to be drawn out with it…

A dark and compulsive detective novel, for fans of Chris Carter and M.W Craven.

Carl Goodman is from Surrey and 20/20 is his first crime thriller. It introduces Eva Harris, a newly promoted DI with a computer science background, thrown in at the deep end with an especially gruesome murder. Carl likes hard-hitting, contemporary stories with dark and unusual themes and is currently working on more DI Eva Harris novels.

Twitter

My thoughts: this is a grisly one and no mistake. I could picture the exact scene in Le Chien Andalou as soon as it was mentioned. I think all the crime fiction I read means I’m not very squeamish but I know eyes are where some people (including Mr Mads) draw the line. It grosses them out too much. And I do get it. But it just doesn’t bother me. However, someone is killing innocent people and stealing their eyes, which is super weird and there might actually be two killers here.

I liked Eva, I felt a bit sorry for her as she was being manipulated by a particularly nasty boss, trying to solve two sets of murders, and not die because someone keeps trying to kill her. But she’s tough, holds her ground and does her job, even when, as a cyber specialist, she feels completely out of her depth. Her team are pretty capable too, and she comes to rely on them, building a strong relationship especially with Becka Flynn. I can’t wait to see what other cases await this crack team in leafy Surrey.

I related to the area too, my grandparents live not far from Kingston and I went there a lot as a teenager and student, so I know it well. Always entertaining seeing your old haunts through new eyes as it were!

I really enjoyed this book, I’d been in a bit of a slump and turns out what I needed was a series of truly brutal killings to get me out of it. Not entirely sure what that says about me though…

*I was kindly gifted a copy of this book in exchange for taking part in the blog tour but all opinions remain my own.