Review: The Boy in the Headlights by Samuel Bjork

Title: The Boy in the Headlights

Author: Samuel Bjork

Series: Holger Munch & Mia Kruger, #3

Published: October 2019, Corgi

Format: Paperback, 384 pages

Source: Personal copy

Summary:
The bestselling series, a former Richard and Judy bookclub pick, returns with another chilling case.Munch and Krüger. An unexpected pairing. A brilliant team.
Winter 19996 An old man is driving home when his headlights catch an animal on the empty road up ahead. He stamps hard on the brakes. But it is not an animal at all. It is a young boy, frightened and alone, with a set of deer antlers strapped firmly to his head.

Fourteen years later, a body is found in a mountain lake. Within weeks, three people have died. Each time, the killer has left a clue, inviting Special Investigations Detectives Munch and Krüger to play a deadly game – a game they cannot possibly win. Against the most dangerous and terrifying kind of serial killer. One who chooses their victims completely at random.

To find the killer they must look deep within their own dark pasts, but how can you stop a murderer when you cannot begin to predict their next move?

 

My thoughts:  This
is the third book in Samuel Bjork’s Holger Munch and Mia Kruger crime
fiction series and it was as thrilling and gripping as the first two books. I am
so glad that the group I did a buddy read for the first book has decided
to read all three books. This is a series that has been on my tbr for
way too long and I’m glad to have finally read all three of these books!

This book was completely gripping right from the start. I highly recommend reading this series in order if at all possible as you will have such a better sense of who the characters are. While each case that the team works on in every book is self-contained, there are threads that do carry over, particularly from the previous book to this one, so having that previous knowledge would just give you a better appreciation for what the characters have gone through. But again, that’s up to you as a reader.

I will say this particular installment really kept me on my toes. The killings were all so strange and seemed at first glance to have nothing to do with each other – but of course, that is not to be the case. I loved how atmospheric this book was and how hard the team worked to put all the clues together to figure things out.

This book had such a strong procedural element to it and I loved that. Mia and Holger are just such an odd pair, yet they work together so well. I just can’t put into words how much I love this pairing. I love how they frustrate each other yet they can’t seem to work a case without the other one present. They need each other. 

This book becomes such an intricate cat and mouse game that digs deeper than Mia and Holger can ever imagine. It becomes quite a nightmare for them the longer the case goes on. This serial killer might just be the end of them…unless they can figure out the game first.

This series has quickly become one of my favorites. I read somewhere that Bjork plans on writing six books in this series and I so hope that is indeed true…I’m not ready to end my time with these characters! I want more!!!

Books in this series:

  1. I’m Traveling Alone
  2. The Owl Always Hunts at Night
  3. The Boy in the Headlights
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