Book: The Girl in the Ice ( Detective Erika Foster) by Robert Bryndza

★★★¹⁄₂/★★★★★

“The secret of blending in, is don’t try to. Everyone is so fucking self-obsessed.”

The Girl in the Ice is the first in the Detective Erika Foster series, a thriller by Robert Bryndza. I'd heard a lot of good things about this book from my blog friends and I can say I was pretty excited when I finally picked it up. But despite the excitement I felt, it took me a while to finish it. The first few chapters were a bit slow for me but I'm glad I stuck to it until the end. I haven't read a lot of thrillers but this one is a good one.

The book centers on DCI Erika Foster when she is called down to South London to investigate a murder case involving a body of a woman found under a thick sheet of ice. Erika has been off the police force for the past months due to the death of her husband and we see how she's still struggling because of it. She tries to do her best to solve the case but when she starts to find some leads with the help of her new colleagues, the victim's wealthy father and the higher ups start to meddle. At some point she is kicked off the case because her boss wants her to play by some rules but Erika only wants to do her job properly and not to be dictated what to or not to do. 

I think Erika Foster is a strong character, a smart and determined woman. She has some ups and downs but they don't stop her from doing what's right. We also see some backstory of what happened to her husband which I think helped on understanding her more. I also actually like Moss and Peterson! The three of them make a great team and I would like to see more of them working together. 

What I love most when reading mystery/thriller is when the author keeps on making me guess what will happen next or who the real culprit is. In this book, I kept guessing until the middle part where I finally figured out who the killer was! And man, did I get that right! But still, the turn of events are unexpected and there are a lot of suspects until finally the last few pages reveal who it really is.

Overall The Girl in the Ice is a good debut thriller novel. The pacing is just right (though for me the first few chapters were a bit slow), it has great story line, impressive writing, has some twists and turns and intriguing characters. I'm planning on reading the second book in the series some time soon.