Taken on Face Value. The French Collection, #4

A riveting and unforgettable story of murderer and mystery in another runaway thriller by author Graham Hamer. Detective Benedict Blewett has moved to France to be with his fiancée, Nicole Dubourg - a forensic pathologist. So death is never far from their door in this chilling story of murder and suspense. Right from the start, Benedict's new boss, Lieutenant Jérôme Bérenger, makes no secret of his dislike of the English policeman.
He presents Benedict with an impossible case - to find out what happened to a man whose rotting corpse has no finger tips, no face, and whose insides have been eaten by rats. Then, within days, a woman's body floats to the surface of Canal St. Martin in Paris. She, too, has had her face removed. There are no DNA matches for either murder victim, and the woman's fingerprints are meaningless because of the time she spent underwater.
. Undaunted, Benedict pushes on relentlessly, but dark forces are at work. In a desperate attempt to silence them, a group of hired thugs try to kill Benedict and Nicole. After a terrifying fight for their lives, the pair realise how much danger their investigation has put them in. They discover that a ruthless, shadowy mastermind called Anton ordered their elimination, but who is Anton? Benedict is nothing if not determined and, in a masterful climax, you can be sure it's going to end badly for someone.
The only questions are, how? and for whom? Taken on Face Value is perfect for lovers of Mark Dawson, Anthony Horowitz, or Peter James novels.