Review: CAPTURING AN ELUSIVE SERIAL KILLER
Rating: 4 out of 5
Date: 09 30, 2012
In bucolic Chalk Valley, a body is discovered.  A grisly find that launches a murder investigation and from the start stumps the investigators.  When two more bodies are found awhile later, it now begins to look like a serial killer is at work.Meanwhile, police officer Dave Kreaver, from Baywater, BC, is still trying to bring a would-be abductor to justice.  A man who has evaded charges because the evidence did not add up to anything substantial.  But Kreaver has a strong feeling about this one....As time passes and as tips flow into the call lines, those in pursuit of their killer keep dropping the ball, losing out because of their inability to link the evidence to any one suspect.  And the investigators working on their separate cases will not realize for quite awhile the connections that bind them together.Readers know almost immediately, of course, as the obvious perpetrator is introduced on the very first pages as he is abducting a young girl who happens to be the very one discovered dead in Chalk Valley.  But the cops don't know it.  And even when they begin to suspect his connection, it takes a long time and a great deal of effort before he is finally captured.Chalk Valleywas a captivating read that had me hooked almost immediately.  There were details in the opening pages that were quite grisly; and there were so many characters introduced that it felt a bit confusing.  But as they were fleshed out and as we begin to see the toll this case was taking on each of them, the story seemed to be about a lot more than capturing this killer.  It was about how police work is often stymied and even stalled by minutiae; how connections and links are almost lost because of poor communication; and how lives are destroyed by the sheer stress and toll that the job requires of those on the case.As much as I enjoyed the story, which picked up its pace drastically toward the end, the overwhelming detail did impede my enjoyment at times.  However, I would recommend it for anyone who loves a good serial killer pursuit, especially when the police finally are able to capture the elusive perpetrator.  Four stars.