Book Review: Left For Dead

Police detective-turned-author Caroline Mitchell's Left For Dead opens well enough. DI Amy Winter and her sister are out shopping when she spots a mannequin on display, a beautifully attired bride encrusted in diamonds, until she realises something is wrong: it's not a dummy at all but a real human left for dead. More deaths follow, and the hunt for the serial killer ensues, sending Winter on the edge, whose personal life is further complicated by the upcoming trial of her biological mother, also a notorious murderer. A realistic police procedural (to the extent it can be allowed), Mitchell's latest entry in the series is more a whydunit — for the killer's identity is revealed right at the very start. It's, then, simply a game of cat and mouse that doesn't quite land, with the antagonist turning out to be a cardboard cut-out of a psychopath with no dimension and the bread crumbs leading to the big finish interrupted by Winter's apprehensions about the looming trial and her contentious equation with her mother. A bland, serviceable thriller that could have used more smarts.