Crime Fiction Early Review: The Enemy Inside by Vanessa Skye

The Enemy Inside by Vanessa Skye (The Enemy Inside #1)

Egalley thanks to The Writer's Coffee Shop

Synopsis from Goodreads
Chicago Detective Alicia Raymond, aka Berg, hides her depression and a brutal past with dangerous, anonymous sex and an obsessive desire to track down killers. Bringing murderers to justice is the only thing she has in her life worth living for.

Her partner, Detective Inspector Jay O’Loughlin, has a few secrets of his own. He knows Berg isn’t as perfect as her faultless veneer, but as his intense attraction to her grows, can he overlook it?

Captain Louise Leigh assigns them to investigate the gruesome murder of a trucker and repeat sex offender. But before they can get a lead on the killing, another trucker’s body is found on the highway. Soon the bodies pile up, and it’s a race against time to find the killer before their Chief, Consiglio, uses them as scapegoats to fulfill his political aspirations.

When Berg’s DNA is found on one victim, her career looks to be over. In the course of clearing her name, she and Jay grow even closer, so when her sordid sex life is exposed, their precarious relationship comes under fire. With nothing to lose, Jay and Berg forge ahead and defy direct orders to continue working on the cases, until Jay disappears.

Desperate to find him, Berg stops at nothing to unearth what links the murders together, eventually uncovering a sadistic vigilante exacting revenge for a thirty-year-old gang rape. The sheer viciousness of the rape makes Berg question her place in a justice system that increasingly allows the guilty to go unpunished.

Berg fears for Jay’s life, but her demons are overwhelming. As events spiral out of control, Berg is forced towards a final confrontation with the killer where she will face the ultimate test: surrender to the evil inside her or finally confront the past she would rather bury.

Release date: August 8th 2013.

Amazon  US/UK | Amazon kindle US/UK | The Book Depository US/UK

7.5/10

* * *

The Enemy Inside is a very good police procedural and an excellent crime fiction. I've enjoyed reading about the hunt for the killer, the forensics and the slow detective work. The killings themselves are so vicious and psychotic that you can't help but get a chill just reading about them... But you hear BUT, right?


This is a great debut book for Vanessa Skye, but in my opinion characterisation of the main heroes  did not go deep enough for me to truly connect to Berg and Jay.

Both have deep psychological issues and both are leading self-destructive lives. 

Berg is more messed up and she inflicts physical pain on herself in a variety of ways just to escape the mental pain and guilt and darkness and feelings or worthlessness she is fighting on a daily basis. She was abused as a child and she is basically still punishing herself for something that she had no power to stop in the past.

When Jay accidentally finds out about her sex and BDSM addiction he just recommends her to go to sex addicts anonymous groups concentrating on sex issue instead of the root of her problems. I'm sorry but that's sloppy as hell. She self-harms basically no matter how, but she does. Berg needs therapy and self-harmers support group not the sex addict group! That just threw me.

Jay himself is a good man but he makes misguided decisions and both of them suffer for that.

What I found most interesting is the identity of the killer and the political intrigues behind the police relationship with the press. I also guessed the identity of the killer wrong first, and only two quarters of the way through I understood who it was, so that was pretty good.

Overall, a recommended read for anyone interested in crime fiction, but with few slight reservations.

* * *

Читался дебют Ванессы Скай хорошо, нормальная интересная детективная история, где я постоянно задавалась вопросом, а кто же стоит за серийными убийствами? Как обычно происходит в этом жанре, полицейские процедуры описаны тщательно и хорошо передана атмосфера детективного отдела и постояных приколов  детективов друг над другом.

Я также нашла интересными интриги между начальством, которое пыталось скрыть, что убийства были совершены серийным убийцем от публики, чтобы их шансы на победу в выборах шефа полиции округа не рухнули. Это совершенно не помогло самому расследованию.

Слабостью книги оказалась недостаточная характеризация героев, я совершенно к ним ничего не чувствовала. Даже злодей под конец меня совсем не впечатлил.

Детективы Берг и Джэй испытывают разные психологические проблемы и ведут губительный для души образ жизни. Берг нужно постоянно испытывать физическую боль, чтобы избежать боли душевной, поэтому она наносит себе раны или ходит в клубы БДСМ. Она была изнасилована отчимом в детстве и как большинство жертв не получивших психологическую помощь, винит во всём себя и не может не чувствовать, что она бесполезное и слабое существо.

Джэй после смерти жены от передозировки наркотиками спит со всем, что движется и шарахается от малейших знаков привязанности, но когда он случайно узнаёт о зависимости Берг, он советует ей начать посещать группу анонимных сексуально-озабоченных. Я вас умоляю, причем здесь секс?! Ей была нужна хорошая терапия, и Берг от этого совершенно не стало лучше.

В общем на уровне личностном эта грязная книга (в смысле, что характеры плохо проработаны).  Всё остальное в ней читабельно. Так что, имейте в виду.