This supernatural, horror, thriller is about a killer who mutilates bodies and leaves the corpses half human and half animal.
The murders take place in Detroit and the detective has a difficult time trying to piece together the clues left by the killer.
This really wasn't the type of book I enjoy, but the storyline was interesting.
I do thank the author,publisher and Netgalley for my ARC in exchange for my honest review.

Just the right amount of weird following Beukes' success with The Shining Girls; a little creepy, a little thriller-y, a lot impossible to put down.

If you're looking for a disturbing serial killer novel, you've just found it! After reading the publisher's synopsis which describes the first murder I knew I was so going to read this, and it didn't hurt that Stephen King recommends it. Several murders follow and each gets worse. There is a small paranormal element to the case which is left mostly for the reader to decide what's what. But I felt that element took the book from crime fiction to horror easily. This is my first book by Beukes and I found it a page-turner. Not exactly a short book, I did read it quickly having a hard time putting it down. I loved all the characters and found them to be well-developed, even minor characters. I'll be looking at her other books from here.

Gripping murder mystery that will give you chills for days. I received a copy on Netgalley, when this was a new release, and I regret not reading it sooner. It took me two days of non stop reading. A thrilling mesh of characters, grouchy police detectives, a teenager daughter of the lead detective, a homeless man, a blogger, and various others. It only takes about 15% percent of the book to hook you in and spins out from there in a forever loop. There are hints to the murderer's madness that makes you think he has schizophrenia, or a stroke. If you start this be prepared to be stunned.

Great read!
Nice character development and story was awesome.

Good horror novels are hard to find because sustaining a strong level of horrific suspense is difficult to maintain. Those few authors who've become synonymous with horror have done so by finding the key holding the reader's attention while delivering a strong, horrific story.

In <em>Broken Monsters</em>, Lauren Beukes shows that she's one of the newer authors that we need to pay attention to because she's got a tremendous sense of rhythm with her words and characters, but she's not quite there yet with her story development.

Beukes captures our attention right from the start when a body is found that is disturbing (even to Detroit detectives) because a young boy's torso has been fused with the carcass of a deer. More bodies are found that rival the deer boy and the local detectives are in a race to find the sick killer and keep the news of these twisted murders from terrifying the public. To complicate matters, the lead detective's daughter takes on crime fighting without her mother's knowledge and puts herself in tremendous danger, and a local journalist trying to track down the killer on his own.

The characters that Beukes creates are wonderful. Everyone is a living, breathing soul and she gives them desires and flaws that are recognizable in each of us. Beukes has a keen sense of bringing humanity to her characters on paper and it is this that keeps us reading.

But the plot dissolves for this reader. Once caught by that opening chapter, I wanted to get in and follow the good detective Gabriella Versado and find the sick killer and learn why the murders were happening in the way that they were. But in trying to create a novel from the story, Beukes adds subplots that do more to distract than actually add horror. We fade from a horror/thriller to a supernatural/horror and back again.

But we also get the sense that the 'broken monsters' aren't just the dead being combined with animals, but all of the characters in this world, including our protagonists. This suggests that Beukes is bringing a lot more literary power to a horror story than one typically finds, which is delightful, but it might also complicate a thriller unnecessarily.

We almost get the feeling that the author wasn't quite sure what story she wanted to tell and kept changing her mind along the way and because of this the literary ride gets bumpy.

I can see that I am going to really enjoy reading more Lauren Beukes. There is a lot of potential with <em>Broken Monsters</em> and combined with her collection, <em>Slipping</em> (which I've reviewed <a href="http://lookingforagoodbook.com/2017/01/10/slipping-lauren-beukes/" target="_blank">here</a>), I can tell that I'm really going to enjoy her works as she grows.

Looking for a good book? <em>Broken Monsters</em> is a dark, sometimes supernatural thriller by Lauren Beukes that may have you on the edge of your seat at times, but gets a little too involved in sub-plots to make it consistently thrilling.

I received a digital copy of this book from the publisher, through Netgalley, in exchange for an honest review.

I have not been able to read this book. Illness intervened.