The Fifth to Die #4MK
Author: J.D. Barker
Published: July 10, 2018
416 pages
Reviewed By: Jessica
Dates Read: July 2- 15, 2018
Jessica’s Rating: 4.5 stars
Book Description:
In the thrilling sequel to The Fourth Monkey, a new serial killer stalks the streets of Chicago, while Detective Porter delves deeper into the dark past of the Four Monkey Killer.
Detective Porter and the team have been pulled from the hunt for Anson Bishop, the Four Monkey Killer, by the feds. When the body of a young girl is found beneath the frozen waters of Jackson Park Lagoon, she is quickly identified as Ella Reynolds, missing three weeks. But how did she get there? The lagoon froze months earlier. More baffling? She’s found wearing the clothes of another girl, missing less than two days. While the detectives of Chicago Metro try to make sense of the quickly developing case, Porter secretly continues his pursuit of 4MK, knowing the best way to find Bishop is to track down his mother. When the captain finds out about Porter’s activities, he’s suspended, leaving his partners Clair and Nash to continue the search for the new killer alone.
Obsessed with catching Bishop, Porter follows a single grainy photograph from Chicago to the streets of New Orleans and stumbles into a world darker than he could have possibly imagined, where he quickly realizes that the only place more frightening than the mind of a serial killer is the mind of the mother from which he came.
Jessica’s Review:
My review of The Fourth Monkey, the first in the series is here.
J.D. Barker is back with The Fifth to Die, sequel to The Fourth Monkey (4MK). This is another brilliant novel in the series. Be warned in advance: there is a cliffhanger to this one…. I need the third (and possibly final??? ) book now! I really like Detective Porter and Bishop is just frightening and now we see where he gets it from: His mother!
I would say you could read The Fifth to Die before 4MK, but I would not recommend it at all! You would see what’s going on as this novel goes into the past some, BUT you would miss so many of the details and you NEED to know 4MK’s gruesome background! You will not understand the brutality or how extreme of a sociopath Bishop is without reading 4MK.
There is quite the punch of activities that occur in a short amount of time in Fifth. We have multiple POVs and more than one bad guy. The mystery with what is going on with the girls keeps you reading wondering what will happen next. And thank you J.D. Barker for totally freaking me out by the overdose one character dies of: I am currently taking that medication!!
Bishop is fast becoming a favorite serial killer of mine and I look forward to see what Barker brings us next in this series. I just hope it isn’t too long!
The reason I rated The Fifth to Die 4.5 stars (rounded up to five for Goodreads, Amazon, etc) was that I personally wanted more of Bishop in the novel. His presence wasn’t as high in this one as I wanted. BUT we do get another frightening serial killer! J.D. Barker, how do you come up with these characters in your mind?????
Special thanks to the publisher Houghton Mifflin Harcourt and J.D. Barker for my arc copies!
The Fifth to Die is highly recommended!
Giveaway Alert!!!:
**Be sure to go to Jessica’s Reading Room on Facebook for a chance to win a SIGNED arc copy of The Fifth to Die sent to me by J.D. Barker!! It runs through Saturday morning!!!!