David Stone - 30/08/2009

Dexter by Design is the fourth book in Jeff Lindsay's series about a friendly neighbourhood serial killer and is a real return to form for Lindsay after the disappointing third book in the series, Dexter in the Dark. Dexter Morgan is most often described as a vigilante serial killer meaning that, in theory at least, he only kills bad guys (and gals). When he's not busy killing people, Dexter works as a blood-splatter expert for the Miami police and does his best to appear a regular guy, the most recent step in his pursuit of normality being his marriage to long-term and incredibly trusting girlfriend Rita. While on honeymoon in Paris, Dexter and Rita witnessed a bizarre example of performance art where the artist amputated her own leg and this disturbing spectacle is echoed in the first crime scene that Dexter is called out to after he returns home, a gruesome tableau involving two mutilated corpses displayed so as to parody the area's tourist trade has been discovered on the beach. While investigating this latest killer to torment the people of Miami, Dexter's sister Deborah Morgan is stabbed by the killer and so Dexter joins forces with Deborah's boyfriend ex-CIA agent Chutsky to track down her attacker before he can strike again. The Dexter books may seem quite controversial since the hero is actually a serial killer but Jeff Lindsay has written the character of Dexter Morgan in such a way that he is very understandable and easy to sympathise with even though some of what he does is shocking. The books certainly don't glorify serial killers since Dexter often has angst over what he does and would much rather be normal, even he is only partly convinced by the idea that it is ok to kill killers. Dexter by Design might not have been the most realistic of stories but I really enjoyed it, there was just the right amount of tension, comedy and the macabre.