What Waits for You

Starred review from November 23, 2020
Schneider’s mesmerizing sequel to 2020’s One Day You’ll Burn features a chillingly brutal murderer, nicknamed the Creeper, who sneaks into his victims’ homes, where he hides for hours or longer before killing them and mutilating their corpses. Tully Jarsdel, who was a doctoral candidate in classical antiquity before joining the LAPD, is assigned to the team trying to catch the Creeper, whose members are desperately searching for a connection among the victims, who include a retired teacher, a fabric store owner, and an artist. Jarsdel seeks guidance from Alisha Varma, an outside-the box researcher into human behavior, who’s been hired as a police consultant, and believes that the design of public spaces can drive down crime rates. The death toll rises despite Jarsdel’s best efforts, and includes a shocking victim. Schneider’s pulse-quickening prose and facility at evoking menace elevate this well above many similarly themed books. The standout combination of concept and jaw-dropping twists will remind some of John Farrow’s The Storm Murders. Agent: Eve Attermann, WME.

December 4, 2020

LAPD Homicide Detective Tully Jarsdel thinks it's an honor to be sent to the Creeper Task Force until he meets the other recruits and realizes it's a dumping ground. The news media dubbed the serial killer "The Eastside Creeper" because he hid in houses before torturing and killing the residents. Vigilantism is on the rise in the terrorized city by the time Tully is temporarily transferred. He hopes the LAPD's new consultant can give him some advice, but she's more concerned with changing the city physically with lights, benches, and fences that emit sound, all designed to lower the crime rate. However, her next plan leads to the suicide of a prominent priest. The city is already on edge, but his death, followed by the murder of a policeman's wife, pushes the police force and the city to the brink. Tully, an academic--turned--police detective, feels lost until a false arrest sends him on a lone crusade that ends in a violent confrontation with the only person who can identify the Creeper. VERDICT The sequel to One Day You'll Burn is graphically violent with too much psychobabble and a disappointing ending in which the serial killer solution is an afterthought.--Lesa Holstine, Evansville Vanderburgh P.L., IN

Copyright 2020 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

December 15, 2020
An abrasive, erudite detective matches wits with an uber-violent serial killer. When Bill and Joanne Lauterbach's worried daughter is unable to reach them for days, police check out the couple's home. Rookie patrolman Evan Porter and his training supervisor, Sgt. Melissa Banning, find a chaotic, horrific scene. Porter announces cryptically that "the house is bleeding" before going inside, where he's violently attacked, ending up in the ICU. Banning's not so lucky. This is the fourth bloody incident involving The Eastside Creeper, a killer believed to spend hours hiding inside other people's homes before he violently strikes. Nerves in Los Angeles are already frayed because of a massive earthquake a week earlier, and morale at the Hollywood police station is understandably low. Enter sardonic, overeducated LAPD detective Tully Jarsdel, who banters with his partner, Morales, over the killer's profile. Bureaucratic scrambling comes to the fore as Jarsdel's taken off the case, then invited onto Hollywood Special, the new unit handling it. Tensions rise even higher after the wife of the lieutenant leading the Special becomes a victim. The road to apprehension is full of detours that accommodate Schneider's juicy prose and quirky characters. There's an extended feud with Jarsdel's increasingly irrational father. And Jarsdel, who left a Ph.D. program in English to join the force, describes the opinions of colleague and possible love interest Alisha Varna as "obelisks of intellectual rigor." A buoyant, unrestrained Grand Guignol noir, relishing the journey, indifferent to the destination.

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February 1, 2021
Readers tearing into this stunning cop novel will likely experience a what-the-hell moment when they meet the cops on the case. Lead LAPD Detective Tully Jarsdel is a former doctoral candidate in classical antiquity. His lieutenant is a one-time actor who once played Pentheus in The Bacchae. They discuss the sad fate of the Pantages Theater in L.A. while the author goes on about tiki art and the seventeenth-century pirate l'Olonnais, who roasted his prisoners on spits. Then the murders take center stage. They're unusually cruel, committed by a killer who hides inside the victims' houses for days before murdering. At this point in the plotline it becomes clear what author Schneider has attempted and grandly achieved: an old-fashioned novel adorned with classy writing, smart and articulate characters, startling observations--""piety is a form of narcissism""--and a puzzle cleared up by Holmesian detective work. Readers may find it helps to know the Billy Wilder film Double Indemnity, and that the ""gel"" here is a light filter and not short for ""gelatin."" A hugely entertaining read.

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