Stan Green, the NYPD homicide detective at the center of Dave Zeltserman’s latest A Killer's Essence is beset by a great lineup of afflictions – a contentious relationship with his ex-wife, a losing battle to bond with his kids who live with their mom and her new husband (who – gasp – is teaching Stan’s son to be a Red Sox fan), an injured and laid-up partner, a high-maintenance girlfriend getting fed up with his endless work-related absenteeism, a cranky old boss who wants the grisly murder he’s investigating solved like yesterday, and he owes too much money to some very nasty gangsters. But Stan’s week gets considerably more complicated when he learns that he’s got big black holes in his face where his eyes should be. At least that what his eyewitness tells him.

Of all the people to have witnessed the murder Stan’s working, he’s stuck with Zachary Lynch, a recluse with some peculiar uh, issues. Seems Lynch has hallucinations when he looks at people – most people, certainly the killer and apparently Stan too. Zachary sees right through to their soul when he looks at them. He’s tormented by visions of monsters every time he walks down the street. I suppose that’s why he stays locked inside his apartment as much as possible.

Poor Stan. Not since Turner met Hooch, have I felt so much for the poor cop saddled with an uncooperative , if essentially likable witness. Oh well, at least he can enjoy his 2004 Yankees sweeping the Red Sox in the ALCS, right? Yeah, it’s gonna be a bad week for Stan.

But Stan’s bad week is our good read. Zeltserman uses each of the many stressors in his protagonist’s life to squeeze and irritate all of the others with a sadist’s understanding of his character’s limits while proving just how adept he is at yet another cross-genre  category, (let’s call this one a quasi-procedural, horror/thriller, that okay with you?) Whether it’s the William Powell/Myrna Loy Thin Man-esque Julius Katz and Archie, the dark-heart territory of his Man Out of Prison trilogy (Small Crimes, Pariah, Killer), the vampiric thrills of Blood Crimes or the supernatural-tinged horror of Caretaker of Lorne Field, Zeltserman seems at home and in charge wherever he parks his pen.

Check out his essay on The Razor Thin Line Between Crime and Horror.

Jedidiah Ayres writes fiction and keeps the blog Hardboiled Wonderland.