The cleaner
By: Paul Cleave
Publisher: Black Swan Crime
Published: 2006
Place of publication: Auckland
Language: eng
Number of pages: 427
ISBN-13: 9781869417604
Subjects: Serial murderers; Fiction
Description: Three-letter word for omniscient being, middle letter 0 ... Joe. After all, Joe is in control of everything in his simple life, including both his day job at the police department and his 'night work'. Nor is he bothered by the daily news reports of the Christchurch Carver, who, they say, murdered seven women. But Joe knows the Carver only killed six. He knows that for a fact. And Joe is going to find that copy-cat killer, he's going to punish him for the one, then frame him for the other six. It's a perfect plan because he already knows he can outwit the police. All he has to do now is take care of all the women who keep getting in his way; his domineering mother, for one. Then there is Sally, the maintenance worker who sees him as a replacement for her dead brother; and the mysterious Melissa, the only woman to have ever understood him, but whose fantasies of blackmail and torture don't have any place in Joe's investigation. The solution is easy ... six-letter word, begins with M. Surprising and compelling, this powerfully written novel is a scarily vivid rendering of the chilling mind of a serial killer.