The 12th Victim by Katia Lief

Title: The 12th Victim 
Author: Katia Lief
ISBN: 9780091944780
Publisher: Ebury Press/2012
Pages: 368
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Back Cover:

The police call him the working girl killer. But no woman is safe…

The 11th victim is found only a short distance from Karin Shaeffer’s house. At the crime-scene she discovers a local prostitute stabbed to death, the knife left embedded in her body.

It is the signature of the ‘Working Girl Killer’ – a serial killer who has terrorised New York City for the last three years. The police are clueless but when Karin’s best-friend becomes the lead investigator, she finds herself drawn into the investigation as a consulting detective.

But as she struggles to understand the dark twisted mind of a murderer, next time the killer is going to strike all too close to home…

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

My views: 

The 12th Victim is the second novel featuring Karin Schaeffer. She seems to have recovered from the dark phase of her life with her second husband, Mac and son Ben. 

A local prostitute is killed with a knife, Karin finds the body and then the body count keeps adding up. When her son's part time nanny too is found murdered, it is too close home
for her. She is not new to murders or serial killers. 

When her best friend becomes a suspect, Karin cannot keep still. She has to find the killer at any cost. And unravels something sinister which involves children. She makes it her goal to protect Dathi, her son's nanny's child. 

Just when one thinks that the killer has been identified, there is a twist. With a good, racy pace, the novel takes us into a roller coaster ride and keeps us totally engrossed. We also like the single minded way of Karin to achieve her goal to nab the killer. 

Katia Lief gives us great moments too despite the grisly murders and grim situations. She also tries to tell us about cultural differences and the common thread running between those. I am going to read more of her novels....