Murder On Magazine — Julie Smith

The TENTH installment of the Skip Langdon series is a New Orleans feast for the senses, a canine love story, an action-packed police procedural made-to-order for readers who like their female sleuths bold, smart, and refreshingly human. A serial killer is using Airbnb units to stage his murders, but a teenage runaway has escaped his grasp and now she's in the wind, believing she's killed him. Meanwhile, the real killer stalks the city â€" and her.

Cody, the pink-haired sixteen-year-old, should be in school or at the mall texting her friends, not hanging out at the intersection of serial murder and human trafficking. When the options are: (1) Return to a life of slavery (2) Go to jail for murder (3) Be killed by a serial killer, Option 4 makes perfect sense â€" RUN! As mean as the streets of The City That Care Forgot can be, this child attracts angels (often unlikely ones) â€" and entire packs of dogs â€" who come to her aid.

She also finds a friend in NOPD's newest Sergeant â€" big (six-foot!), beautiful, tough, and tender-hearted Skip Langdon. Skip knows her best hope of finding the killer is to find Cody â€" plus she feels for the girl, in whom she recognizes a younger version of her plucky, resourceful, whip-smart self. The city's hard-boiled; the detective has a heart the size of the Superdome.