The Beautiful Dead is the story of Eve Singer, a TV crime reporter. She must get to the death scene first, uncover all the gruesome details, and even better, capture live interviews and gory footage on camera. Joe, the trusty cameraman is usually by her side to do this. A horrid job, but Eve is successful, which means we can’t like her that much. Even though we’re responsible for wanting the news she faithfully sniffs out from the smelly underbelly of society.

Eve’s father suffers from dementia, and she cares for him. You see, there is a reason we love Eve. There has to be. We can’t love her for the vital role she fulfils in society.

And then the killer on a bit of a spree starts to make contact with Eve, and we quickly realise she is being set up. For him, you see, murder is an art form.

I have read nearly everything that Belinda Bauer has written. (I’ve only got Finder’s Keepers to go, then even all her older ones are done.) I am therefore used to her wonderful dark sense of humour, her clever prose, quirky yet real characters and deft plotting.

There was something missing from this book, though. And although all of the above boxes were ticked, I think it may have been a little bit of the setting, and the fact that the gasp factor was not as gut wrenching as usual. In past novels, I always felt that there was a great sense of place to create the perfect tension (Exmoor in the Blacklands trilogy, Limeburn in The Facts of Life and Death, the mortuary in Rubbernecker). Here the setting was great, but not an active contributor. And let’s face it, it’s an unusual yet great feature. As I mentioned before, if you’ve read more than one Belinda Bauer, the unusually extraordinary comes to be expected.

So perhaps I should go back and give all of Belinda’s older novels five stars and this one four stars, but I’m going to give this three instead, and tell you that if you haven’t read this fantastic author, you really should. And start with The Beautiful Dead, and then go back and read all her other work. In a class of her own when it comes to crime writers, you won’t be sorry.

Highly recommended. A thrilling read.

Murder as performance art... 3 stars

TV reporter Eve Singer is on the crime beat, so she's called to the scene of a brutal murder committed in the foyer of an office building, just feet from where people are passing by on the pavement outside. This is a murderer who likes to perform his gory crimes in public, and then stage them as if it were some kind of performance art. When he makes contact with Eve, at first it seems like a great thing – she'll have the exclusive story and it will give her career a much needed boost. But soon she realises that she's becoming caught up in the murderer's schemes, almost to the point of becoming an accessory...

First off, let me say that I love Belinda Bauer. And this book has in it many of the things I love her for – the great writing, touches of humour, some nice building of suspense and an original and dramatic climax. However, for me, this isn't one of her best. It feels derivative – there are touches of Hannibal and Clarice in the relationship between Eve and the killer, and heavy shades of Psycho over the storyline. Perhaps there's not much new left to say in the serial killer novel – certainly it's been a while since I read one that felt fresh. But the derivations in this one seemed so blatant that I wondered at points if she was deliberately referencing some of the greats as a kind of inside joke, but if so, it didn't quite come off, and simply ended up feeling rather unoriginal.

The structure also doesn't feel up to Bauer's usual standard. We are given biographies of the characters rather than being allowed to get to know them through the plot – whatever happened to 'show, don't tell'? Eve's father suffers from dementia and this is used partly to give some humour to the book – always tricky with such a sensitive subject and I felt it occasionally passed over into tastelessness. And while I thought the portrayal of his dementia was well done for most of the book, when it became part of the plotting in the later stages it crossed the credibility line and began to feel contrived and inauthentic, and I found myself feeling that this awful disease was being used for entertainment purposes rather than being given the empathy it deserves. The humour didn't work as well for me as usual, I didn't take to Eve much, and the amount of lazy swearing throughout became utterly tedious, not to mention Eve's need to vomit every time a corpse turned up.

On the upside, there are passages where Bauer achieves that delicious feeling of creepiness, for example, when Eve thinks she's being followed home in the dark, and it does have a great thriller ending which redeemed it a little in my eyes. I was also pleased that this murderer was pretty eclectic in his choice of victims, not exclusively butchering vulnerable young women. But overall, this is one I'm going to put down to an off day, and go back to waiting avidly for her next offering. I've given it three stars but, in truth, I think one of those stars is from a mixture of loyalty and the feeling that I may be judging it too harshly because of my perhaps overly high expectations. Because, despite this one, I do love Belinda Bauer. I can't help wondering in general if the pressure to get a new book out every year is really a good thing in the long run...

NB This book was provided for review by the publisher, Grove Atlantic.

Belinda Bauer’s crime novel, The Beautiful Dead begins with the brutal slaying of a young female office worker. We don’t know the name of the killer, but we know that he’s driven by dark impulses that won’t be satisfied with one bloody death. Eve Singer, reporter for iWitness News, on the so-called “meat beat,” is so repulsed by the murder scene that she ends up vomiting in the toilet much to the amusement of rival reporter and overall wanker Guy Smith from News 24/7.

Even though Eve has worked on the crime beat for three years, there’s something particularly horrible about this crime, and even Joe, Eve’s cameraman imagines the horror of the victim’s death:

“Seriously,” he said while he checked the light. “Imagine all those people right there, half an inch away through a pane of glass, Christmas shopping. While some sicko is gutting you like a fish.”

One death soon becomes two, and it’s at that point that Eve is contacted by the serial killer who stages spectacular gory deaths and imagines that he and Eve are somehow in this ‘thing’ together:

We’re in the same line of work, you and I. I need people to die in order to live–and so do you. We’re the same. We want the same things.

Eve already doesn’t like her job and feels morally compromised by certain situations when she begins getting special favours from the killer–without giving too much away–she basically gets a ringside seat. In terms of scooping news stories, this is, of course, a fantastic opportunity, but at the same time, giving the killer a voice and an audience may encourage him. So Eve has a moral dilemma: should she use the exclusives the killer gives her?

Belinda Bauer sets the stage to show us Eve’s desperation. Eve has financial concerns, and she’s in a highly competitive career . If she’s too squeamish to use the killer’s news exclusive ‘gifts,’ others are not, so it’s very easy to justify forming this sort of uneasy partnership with the killer. Also Eve’s job in front of the camera has a very definite shelf life; can she afford to be ethical? But on the other hand if she forms this slimy alliance with a psycho, how will she sleep at night?

There’s a lot of backstory (sometimes too much) to this tale and we see Eve’s problematic home life where she has the burden of her father’s care. We see Eve’s day-to-day job where it’s normal for her to intrude on private lives and speculate on the grief of the families of victims. She’s already engaged in behaviour that most of us would avoid when the serial killer decides to be her ‘friend.’

I really enjoyed Belinda Bauer’s The Shut Eye which took a different path in its exploration of crime and psychics. The Shut Eye was not gory, and so I was not really prepared for the amount of gore in these pages. Readers are best warned before coming to the book that the deaths occur on the page, so to speak. I really liked the character of forensics officer, Veronica Creed who has “the calm detachment of a psychopath, but none of the comforting iron bars between her and the rest of the world,” and I wished we’d seen more of her. Super-serial killers are not my favourite crime sub-genre, so that added to the gore and a Hollywood-style ending all combined into a less than positive reading experience.

But for an entirely different opinion, go to Cleo’s review here.

Review copy

This is only the second book I read by Belinda Bauer, but I am already a big fan. She writes eloquently and finely tuned. The story is never over the top or superfluous.

'or - if she was lucky - that Lush lemon soap that cut through it all like menthol. More often, any respite from body odour and wet coats came in the form of an eye-watering wince of over-optimistic aftershave.'

I especially like the characters for their normality. For instance Eve, who doesn't know what to think about her neighbour Elias. Is he being friendly or a dirty, old man? And what about her colleague Joe? He is a nice guy, but too young for her (him being 26, and she 29), and why is she even contemplating that?

Death is Eve's business. No, she's not a murderer. She doesn't want to hurt anyone. She doesn't get joy from standing over a bloody crime scene. In fact, blood and gore still never fail to make her nauseous. As a reporter, she's spent a lot of time over toilets throwing up her lunch after completing a story. It's not a pretty business, but if it bleeds, it leads... and Eve desperately wants her stories to lead. She needs it, lest she be replaced by the pretty younger reporter that's been sniffing around. She needs a way up... and now she has one. Be careful what you wish for.

This is really a great book. Gripping and even frightening at times with rich characters. The chapters from the perspective of the killer obsessed with Eve were deliciously creepy. His madness is fascinating. Those from Eve's father Duncan, who suffers from dementia, were very poignant. I felt real sadness for him. Making the reader feel emotion for the main character is expected, but to make them feel for several others is impressive. I really cared about what happened to them... from Eve to her father, neighbor, cameraman, and members of the police force. The book isn't particularly short, but so fast paced it seemed to be! I was very satisfied with the ending as well.

I received a copy of this book from Net Galley and Grove Atlantic, thank you! My review is honest and unbiased.

"The Beautiful Dead" is a departure for Belinda Bauer, whose books are often so creepy that they make your skin crawl. This is a fairly straightforward and engrossing novel about a psychotic killer who derives pleasure from watching people die. We learn a little about what makes the perpetrator tick. It is clear that he is intelligent, has enough money to avoid working, and enjoys running rings around the Metropolitan Police. The heroine is twenty-nine year old Eve Singer, a skilled crime reporter who works for iWitness News, whose viewers crave sensational stories—the gorier the better. She is assigned to the "meat beat," which involves "an endless round of bodies black bags, and bloodstains." Eve is distraught, not only because she detests what her slimy and overbearing boss, Ross Tobin, orders her to do, but because her beloved father, fifty-five year old Duncan Siinger, has dementia and is becoming increasingly difficult to manage at home.

The plot involves a series of random killings of innocent men and women who happen to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. The villain mocks the forces of law and order, leaving behind clues that challenge them to catch him if they can. In addition, he tries to recruit Eve as his partner-in-crime; he believes that they have a special connection. Poor Eve is desperate to please the demanding Ross, feeling obliged to deliver the footage he demands, no matter how distasteful, so that she can afford to pay for Duncan's caregiver. The scenes between Eve and Duncan are touching and disturbing. While she adores the memory of the wonderful father he once was, she is increasingly frustrated by her dad's temper tantrums, stubborn refusal to cooperate with her, and inability to remember even the most basic information. She impulsively wishes him dead at one point, and is instantly horrified and guilt-ridden that she could even entertain such a ghoulish thought.

The author knows how to turn a phrase and sprinkles enough black humor into the narrative to lighten the mood when needed. This is neither a standard psychological thriller nor a typical police procedural, although elements of both are present. There are colorful minor characters, but this is Eve's story, and she is a feisty, tough, and determined heroine. Unfortunately, she is also foolish and reckless, risking her life in an effort to stop her adversary from carrying out his master plan. Although it is not electrifying, "The Beautiful Dead" is readable, engrossing, and suspenseful enough to hook us with its initial premise and keep us involved until the last page is turned.

This book definitely deserved the 5 big stars, i knew that when i was halfway through it and i couldn't put it down!
So this was another very interesting book from Belinda Bauer, she certainly knows how to make the reader hold his breath!

Eve Singer is a TV crime reporter, with a career that seemed not promising at all, until she catches the attention of a strange serial killer. Her life was already difficult, but having a serial killer thinking he had a special connection with her made things worse.
The murders were not particularly bloody, but the way they were staged like art exhibitions made them really creepy.

I enjoyed the story very much. And it has been a while since i read a thriller told not from the point of view of detectives. It made it more interesting from the perspectives of a fierce reporter.
The characters were interesting, and i liked how we got to know them. Even the killer, it was fascinating to follow his thoughts all along.

I also liked how the author put some background to the murders, not just some body found on the streets. The way she presented it, sometimes from the perspective of the victim, or the person who would find the body, made it all more personnel and touching, the brutal feeling of lives cut short.

Well, it was a very enjoyable book, and i would recommend it to my friends.

Nice read and easy to follow story line. Look forward to reading more from this author

Eve Singer is a beleaguered TV crime reporter dealing with a pushy boss who wants Eve to be everything: younger, covering every story, and on top of every lead. In her personal life, Eve goes home to her childhood home and her father, Duncan, who is suffering from dementia. When Eve winds up covering the murder of a young woman, she doesn't realize she will soon be entwined with the girl's killer, someone who is obsessed with death, and the desire to be recognized for his "killing performances." As the killer pulls Eve deeper into his twisted web, she has some startling choices to make.

I have to say, my last book of 2016 surprised me. This novel was certainly creepy, but also had a certain nuance and depth to it that I wasn't expecting. Eve is a complicated and likeable character, and the book doesn't just cover murder and gore, it goes into her personal life, and the struggles she has caring for her father and his failing memory. The bits with her father are often both sad and humorous; they are very real and give the book a true humanity. Indeed, there's a real depth to Eve, who is stuck in a man's world and the pressures and unfairness that brings to to her career-wise (there's always a younger, prettier reporter waiting in the wings, as her boss never hesitates to remind her), as well as the burdens a woman feels as a caretaker. After all, it's not her brother taking care of her dad. Further, the book looks at an interesting psychological conundrum: how our society seems to need murder and the way it feeds on the social media aspect of it, as of late. Without society's interest in murder and death, Eve has no job.

Overall, I really enjoyed this one. It lost me slightly for a bit near the end, but managed to get back on track, and even threw in a very interesting twist I didn't see coming. Although I admit, I kept wondering where the police's behavioral scientist was. Why was the poor Lead Detective reading and deciphering everything from a serial killer alone? However, I digress. This was a well-done thriller with a different and engaging plot. I really found myself drawn to Eve, and her father, Duncan. It was an enjoyable novel with which to end the year.

This is my first time reading a book by this author and I am glad I read it. What in intriguing story. This is not your usual thriller, that's for sure. What surprised me the most is the way the main characters met. Had it been me, I think there would be a very different outcome than from what it was for the main characters. I think doing the job Eve does makes her the perfect connection for the killer to showcast his groesome murders. At first that's exactly what will make Eve's job more secure but there is a fine line between being a victim and being just a bystander. When the killer gets to know Eve more and more, his obsession, that he in the end calls love, takes on a deadly turn for Eve. He loves the 'art of dying' but in the end when he's the one to become his art, he behaves like any other ordinary human. He is afraid of death.
I really liked the plot and characters. Each one is unique and interesting. I'm not a fan of the killer but the way he sees his deeds is quite astonishing. And that's just shows what a great author Belinda is.
I defintiely enjoyed the story and I highly recommend it!

I really liked The Beautiful Dead by Belinda Bauer. I didn't love it. Which is saying something as I absolutely loved the other two books I have read by this author.

<i>Right up until the very last second, Layla Martin didn't believe that she would - or could - be murdered. She knew that something would save her. It didn't.</i>

'Eve Singer needs death. With her career as a TV crime reporter flagging, she’ll do anything to satisfy her ghoulish audience.

The killer needs death too. He even advertises his macabre public performances, where he hopes to show the whole world the beauty of dying.

When he contacts Eve, she welcomes the chance to be first with the news from every gory scene. Until she realizes that the killer has two obsessions.

One is public murder.

And the other one is her . . .'

The first third of The Beautiful Dead had my heart pounding, and I was holding my breath as I read, it was so tense. But after that, it lost a little bit of impetus for me. Well, maybe not impetus, but it lost that certain something that sets your heart pounding and makes you unconsciously hold your breath. I know it is difficult to keep up that sort of tension. I know the value of sucker-punching the reader in the first chapter to grab their attention. And I love it. But you really do need to follow through. And while it was a likeable enough read, really, it just began to get rather implausible and continued in that vein.

There are some humorous moments scattered in amongst the death......Eve's father has Alzheimer's, and his antics are responsible for most of these moments. Joe, Eve's cameraman, for a few others.

It is not a bad read. But it wasn't the compelling 'can't put this book down, go away, don't disturb me' read that I have come to expect from Bauer.

3.5 stars from me (upgraded to 4 because I love Bauer).

Thank you to NetGalley and Grove Atlantic for providing a review copy of The Beautiful Dead by Belinda Bauer. All opinions expressed in this review are entirely my own