Hard Girls: An unputdownable serial killer thriller Cole, Martina

DI Kate Burrows is back, dragging herself out of a decade-long retirement to hunt a killer targeting sex workers in London. One by one, women are disappearing from the streets — and Kate knows if she doesn't act fast, the body count will climb. Martina Cole writes British crime fiction with zero gloss and maximum grit. She doesn't flinch from the darker corners of the underworld, and she doesn't treat her victims as props. This is procedural fiction that pulls no punches — the stakes are brutal, the tension escalates hard, and Kate Burrows remains one of the genre's most compelling detectives. If you're after slick Scandi noir, look elsewhere. If you want raw, street-level British crime with a detective who's lived enough to be interesting, this delivers.