So Close the Hand of Death-J.T. Ellison

So Close the Hand of Death
J.T. Ellison
Mira, Feb 22 2011, $7.99
ISBN: 9780778329435

Across the United States copy cat serial killers of dead or jailed psychopaths surface. Law enforcement is stretched way too thin as the homicidal frenzy is from sea to shining sea. The media adds to the taut situation demanding underpaid and understaffed cops do their jobs.

Nashville police homicide lieutenant Taylor Jackson knows who the mentor of these crazed killers is. The Pretender has returned with a horde of trained deadly predators imitating the worst murderers of society. She also knows his personal target is her as she has been for quite a while (see The Cold Room, for instance). The apprentice killers are just background noise to isolate her from support and to break her mentally with what happens to those who remain close to her. The Pretender is coming for the woman he cherishes and loathes for cherishing her.

So Close the Hand of death is an exciting Taylor Jackson police procedural (see All The Pretty Girls) that grips the audience with suspense as fans anticipate the Pretender coming close enough to Jackson to either kiss or kill her. Fast-paved and tense from the onset, fans of the series will appreciate the latest case though wonder whether Jackson is a modern day Typhoid Mary as anyone who befriends her throughout the six books is in jeopardy from a serial killer.

Harriet Klausner