Is evil alive...? Dr Jerry Halpern is trying to find out, studying for his PhD on the subject. Dexter Morgan, meanwhile, has a few wicked things of his own to contend with - not least, planning his wedding to Rita to complete his nice-guy disguise. But when a student of Halpern's is found burnt, molested and headless - seemingly sacrificed to an ancient god - and Dex is brought in as forensic analyst to help investigate, he realises he could be dealing with someone a whole lot more sinister than he is. Soon it seems the dark passenger in Dexter's head has gone into hiding. And when something creeps out your friendly neighbourhood serial killer, you know it's serious...As Halpern and Dexter are stalked by death, it looks like it's getting personal - especially as Dex now has a family to protect. Gradually, Dexter realises his stepchildren might share his extra-curricular interest in death. Could he help them target their bloodlust, just as he steers his own? But to do that, Dex must cope with a certain mutilated sergeant from his past, and more importantly...stay alive...
As much as I enjoyed the first two books in this series... I just didn’t like this one. In this third installment, Dexter’s Dark Passenger becomes its own being, and goes AWOL. I preferred thinking of the Dark Passenger as just a voice in Dexter’s head, not some amorphous lizard thing that makes relatively normal people want to kill. It just rubbed me the wrong way. The Dark Passenger’s absence does create some interesting inner conflict for Dexter, but I think Lindsay just went about it the wrong way. What I do like about this book is Dexter’s growing relationship with Cody and Aster, and it’ll be interesting to see where that goes as Cody’s own shadow gets more insistent. This wasn’t bad enough to make me give up the series, but it was disappointing just the same...
