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Few authors can literally send chills down my spine—or pull me so deeply into a story that when one of my cats knocks a pan off the stove in the kitchen, it scares a shriek from me. But Chelsea Cain has done that with Evil at Heart.
Archie Sheridan has spent most of a decade hunting the elusive serial killer Gretchen Lowell. When he finally catches her, it lands him in the hospital for months, and it nearly breaks his mind. Then Gretchen escapes and makes a deal with Archie: if he promises not to commit suicide, she’ll stop killing. Archie retreats into a psychiatric hospital to heal, but he soon learns that Gretchen can get at him no matter where he goes.
The media has sensationalized Gretchen so much that people think of her as a celebrity. They parade around in T-shirts telling her to run as they take bus tours of the locations where her victims were murdered. She’s one of the most beautiful serial killers in the world—but, make no mistake, she is evil personified. Her specialty is carving out a victim’s spleen with a scalpel as he lies alert and helpless beneath her skillful hands.
When similar murders start popping up again, Archie thinks she’s gone back to killing, so he has no choice but to check out of the hospital and stop her. With the help of a journalist named Susan Ward, he goes a wee bit outside the law in his search for Gretchen. Then Susan uncovers a bizarre fan club that celebrates the number of days Gretchen has been free, and the case takes a chilling new turn.
Evil at Heart is the third Archie and Gretchen book, but I didn’t feel lost while reading it. I did, however, desperately want to go back and read the first two in the series for the pure pleasure of it—and to get a deeper understanding of their relationship. With Archie’s near worship of Gretchen—and the fact that she keeps saving his life—the relationship crosses into peculiar territory.
Though I couldn’t understand society’s worship of Gretchen (after all, she’s truly one scary serial killer), I certainly found it plausible. As I read, I kept muttering Archie’s words over and over: “What’s wrong with people?” But the world is made up of people who have a sick fascination with evil, and this goes double in the fictional world.
While I don’t normally like journalists in fiction—because they’re usually pushy, heartless, and reckless when they go after a story—Susan Ward is a refreshing change. I absolutely loved her spunk and her sense of humor, which helps to lighten the dark subject matter. She also has enough sense to know that she should be afraid when she’s faced with dangerous situations.
Freaky, uncanny, and disturbing, Evil at Heart is a true page-turner—one that will definitely be one of my top ten books of 2009.
