January Blackburn wondered why she had been summoned to FBI Special Ops. It wasn't as if she had impressed someone with her impressive investigative skills – she spent her days training recruits on the firing range in the hope that they would gain sufficient skill to not shoot themselves by accident!

Soon she realises that the authorities are most interested in her knowledge of parapsychology and criminology and finds herself assigned to a sort of cold case squad. Her partner in this new role, Father Scarletti, has been assigned by a discrete section of the Catholic Church and has considerable experience investigating preternatural activity for the Church.

Soon Blackburn finds herself in the midst of the most bizarre investigations – one she couldn't possibly have imagined. Not only does she find herself pursuing a criminal who is actually a vampire – she also discovers that her partner isn't exactly human either, having been born more than two hundred years ago.

This book is the first of what I hope will be many adventures of Blackburn and Scarletti. The stories manage to combine the intrigue of a cold case crime show with the supernatural nature of an episode of the X-Files. Seeing as I enjoy both types of programme this book was definitely to my taste.

One nice touch with this book is that the writing doesn't just cover the investigative side of the storyline. We also learn a lot about Scarletti's background. The experiences of his early life that have made him into the character he is today. We discover what it is like to grow up among castrati living within the Vatican City and singing for the Pope.

I have read quite a few books written by Karen Koehler and I have NEVER been disappointed. I consider her to be an extremely skilled author with a vivid imagination and the ability to paint gloriously detailed pictures with her words.

Karen's books are a must for anyone who enjoys mystery stories with a paranormal theme – highly recommended.

Synopsis
An all-new Slayer collection featuring the novellas "Sins of the Father" and "The Hyde Effect" by acclaimed industrial gothic author Karen Koehler, plus a never-before-released bonus story, "The Sign of Six" featuring the Slayer Alek Knight.

SINS OF THE FATHER
It began with blood, death and a cryptic missive to the police department, one carved with eerie precision into the flesh of a victim's body. What it became was a deadly game of cat-and-mouse between an elusive night stalker and the determined hunters set to the savage killer's trail. Paranormal investigator January Blackburn, fresh from FBI detail, knew instinctively that they were dealing with no ordinary killer--and she knew equally well that the stalker's reign of terror on the velvety night streets of Chicago had only just begun. As death followed unspeakable death, Blackburn became ever more enmeshed in an investigation that would test the very limits of her psychic skills, while Scarletti, her new and frustratingly eccentric partner, worked at testing the farthest limits of her patience! But despite his contemptuous nature, Dorian Scarletti had knowledge of an underworld beyond mortal understanding, a knowledge Blackburn needed, a knowledge gleamed over centures during which he'd mastered his own fantastic powers--powers no human and very few of the dhampiri had ever acquired. And unless he and Blackburn worked together to find the key to the killer's twisted logic, the ancient force of chaos which had been loosened on their world would contiune to consume the city one unsuspecting soul at a time...

THE HYDE EFFECT
A body slashed to pieces. A handful of wolf hairs. A murderer who possesses animal savagery as well as cunning human intelligence. These are Blackburn and Scarletti's only clues to the latest wholesale slaughter going on in the busy industrial backstreets of Boston by night. Their investigation of the increasingly violent crimes leads them to Dante's, a downtown nightclub that caters to werewolves, and its owner, the ever-enigmatic Legion. But Legion and his people are crying innocent even as the rest of the city cries wolf. And as the bodies begin to pile up and the city slides into a state of mass panic, Blackburn and Scarletti find themselves infiltrating an underworld full of beasts and men, where it's difficult to tell one from the other.