Birdman by Mo Hayder
This title is set in Greenwich, south-east London. The Met's crack murder squad, AMIP, is called out by nervous CID detectives to a grim discovery: five bodies, all young women, all ritualistically murdered and dumped on wasteland near the Dome. As each post-mortem reveals a singular, horrific signature linking the victims, officers realize that they are on the trail of that most dangerous offender: a sexual serial killer. Detective Inspector Jack Caffery - young, driven, unshockable - faces both hostility within the force and echoes of his past in this, his first case with AMIP. Haunted by the memory of a death long ago, he employs every weapon forensic science can offer - for he knows it is only a matter of time before this chaotic, sadistic killer strikes again. In this astonishing debut, Mo Hayder has written a novel of frightening and raw intensity which ranks alongside the very best in the genre.